Austin Business Journal writes, "The housing market has seen a decent amount of shifting this year amid broader economic uncertainty and an uptick in inventory.
While new listings and home construction are welcome news in a market that's been starved of inventory for years, there are still a lot of challenges for both buyers and sellers.
The national median profit margin on home sales fell to 50% in the first quarter of this year — down 3.2 percentage points from the fourth quarter of 2024 and down 4.8 points from the first quarter of 2024, reports The Business Journals' Joanne Drilling. It's also down from 64% in 2022.
As I get into in today's lead story, the changing housing market has had some sellers rethink how much they list their homes at — and some are outright taking their homes off the market.
We're definitely not in 2022's housing market anymore.
Inventory grows but buyers still priced out
Inventory in the national housing market is accumulating, which is continuing to tilt the market — albeit slowly — in favor of buyers.
There were 1.36 million U.S. homes on the market for sale in June — the most since November 2019, according to Zillow. Inventory in June was still 21% below pre-pandemic norms, but that gap is narrowing as more sellers list their homes and houses sit on the market for longer.
But those who track the U.S. housing landscape say the market is becoming more favorable to buyers, rather than an outright buyer's market.
"We expected 2025 to be the most buyer-friendly market we’ve seen in nine years. It’s definitely on track for that," Danielle Hale, chief economist at Realtor.com, told me. "But just because it’s the most buyer-friendly market in nine years doesn’t mean it’s a buyer’s market. We were tipped so heavily in favor of sellers that we’re now in a more balanced market."
Kara Ng, senior economist at Zillow, also said she felt the U.S. housing market is currently a "neutral" one, and buyers have had more negotiating power in the spring and summer months this year — seasons in which the power usually lies with sellers.
Federal government lease cuts go beyond DC
We know the federal government's real estate downsizing efforts have hit Washington, D.C., and its metro area the hardest — and that will continue to be true. But it's worth remembering how massive the federal government's real estate portfolio is, and it includes substantial blocks of space in markets across the United States.
A recently released tracker of federal government real estate by Avison Young found some surprising stats about how much space could be chopped in real estate markets outside of D.C.
- More than 1.3 million square feet of General Services Administration-leased space in Georgia is currently in holdover or "soft term" — meaning those leases could be easily canceled, reports Henry Queen at the Atlanta Business Chronicle. A swath of space once occupied by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the Chamblee area is the biggest real estate cut by the GSA in the state so far.
- In South Florida, more than 1 million square feet of federal government leases could be up for termination by the end of 2026, reports Ashley Portero at the South Florida Business Journal. Fort Lauderdale has the most exposure to potential cuts, with 460,000 square feet in leases that could be terminated by the end of next year.
- In the Nashville, Tennessee, metro, more than 400,000 square feet of GSA-leased space could be chopped by late 2026, reports Sophia Young at the Nashville Business Journal. The federal government has terminated three leases in the Nashville area so far, totaling nearly 25,000 square feet.
Despite the potential for a lot of space to be eliminated by the end of next year, it's too hard to say whether all — or any — of the space that could be easily canceled will actually be cut by the GSA.
Greg Martin, principal and managing director at Avison Young’s Fort Lauderdale and Boca Raton offices in Florida, told Portero he believes it's unlikely every soft-term lease will actually be canceled, in part because of the government's return-to-office mandates.
"What you may see is a shifting of GSA tenants in GSA leased space," Martin said. "For example: If the space was originally leased to the Department of Education but they don’t need the space anymore, the GSA could insert another organization like the Department of Health and Human Services into that space instead."
Apartment owners fight back on assessments
We've seen a lot of examples of office landlords contesting their property tax assessments amid a severe weakening of the office market post-pandemic. But in Milwaukee, several apartment owners are also gearing up to fight assessments by the city, reports Addison Lathers at the Milwaukee Business Journal.
Adding it up: The assessed value of commercial properties across Milwaukee increased by about 17% since last year, and apartments led the way with a 22.6% increase, according to the Assessor’s Office in April. Some multifamily properties saw their property assessments increase by 87%. Milwaukee’s apartments in April were assessed for a combined $7.8 billion — up from $6.4 billion last year and $4.7 billion in 2020.
Smitha Chintamaneni, a real estate and tax attorney with Husch Blackwell, who is representing about 20 clients fighting their assessments, said the majority of clients she's working with are multifamily owners.
Many owners are wondering how this year's assessments — which are, on the whole, on the "higher end of historical annual increases," according to Chintamaneni — were calculated and if they need to prepare for more hikes in the future.
Bill Bowers, the chief assessor for the city, told Lathers the city's assessments are based on a number of things, including sales prices of similar buildings last year. He said multifamily buildings were selling for considerably more than they had been assessed at previously. How much revenue a building generates is also considered, and, according to Bowers, rents were higher than anticipated almost across the board.
We've seen a similar story play out in Sun Belt markets, as those areas have boomed, but it's interesting to see the trend start to ripple out in more affordable Midwest cities now, too.
Three big numbers
- 2,100: The size, in acres, of a proposed high-tech manufacturing park in California
- $250M: The size of a fund by Atlanta-based Peachtree Group that'll target the national hotel market
- 1M: How much office space, in square feet, has been eliminated in Philadelphia's central business district since 2020"
Source: Austin Business Journal
Written by: Ashley Fahey
Published: July 24, 2025
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