Market Brief

The South had the second-worst year in the country for signed contracts. Two Florida metros made the national top ten anyway.

Pending contracts fell 2.3% in July and the South dropped 3.0% from a year ago, yet Jacksonville and Miami both made the national top ten for annual gains.

The daily read on the numbers that set Florida housing costs: tax policy, insurance, mortgage rates and construction, and what they mean for a buyer or seller in Northeast Florida this week.

The region fell, and two Florida metros went the other way

The National Association of Realtors reported on August 18 that pending home sales fell 2.3% in July from June and 2.2% from a year earlier, the lowest level since January 2026. Every one of the four major regions declined month over month.

The South, which contains Florida, fell 2.2% for the month and 3.0% for the year. Only the West did worse, at 4.7% and 7.1%.

Then comes the part that did not make the headlines. NAR also published the ten large metros with the biggest year-over-year gains in pending sales, drawn from Realtor.com Economics data. Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach ranked fifth at plus 2.4%, and Jacksonville ranked ninth at plus 1.2%.

Two of the ten strongest metros in the country for signed contracts sit in a state inside the second-weakest region. Both things are in the same release.

Why that is not a contradiction

A region is an average of a very large area. The South in NAR's definition runs from Delaware to Texas, and a 3.0% annual decline across it can be built from a wide spread of local outcomes rather than a uniform slide.

It is worth being careful about how much weight a 1.2% annual gain can carry. It is a small number, it is a single month, and it is derived from a partner dataset rather than from the index NAR computes itself. What it supports is a narrow claim: Jacksonville contract activity did not fall with its region in July. It does not support a claim that Northeast Florida is outperforming, and we are not making one.

We covered the two price releases this cluster sits against separately, and they point the other way for Florida: FHFA has Florida 41st among states for annual price growth, with Jacksonville turning negative, and Case-Shiller has the national index accelerating. Contract counts holding up while prices soften is a coherent combination. It usually means sellers are meeting buyers on price.

The number worth keeping

Buried in the same release is the most useful long-run figure NAR has published this month. Chief economist Lawrence Yun noted that pending contracts are running about 30% below their pre-pandemic 2019 level while payroll employment is about 5% above it.

That is a 35-point gap between how many people are working and how many are signing contracts to buy a house. Yun reads it as pent-up demand waiting on supply and affordability. That reading is a forecast and should be treated as one. The gap itself is not a forecast. It is a measurement, and it is the cleanest single statement of how far transaction volume has fallen away from the underlying economy.

What the rate picture actually says this week

Yun attributed the July pullback to "the highest mortgage rates of the year" landing in midsummer. That is worth checking rather than repeating, because the two most-quoted rate series do not agree right now.

Freddie Mac's survey put the 30-year fixed at 6.65% for the week ending August 20, down two basis points on the week, which we covered in the weekly rate read. Reporting this week on the Mortgage Bankers Association's weekly survey has cited a 30-year contract rate closer to 6.78%, a three-week high, alongside a small decline in application volume.

We are carrying both rather than picking one. The MBA figure could not be verified against MBA's own release for the week in question at the time of writing, and the two series are not measuring the same thing: Freddie Mac surveys lenders on offered rates, MBA reports contract rates on actual applications excluding points. A gap of ten to fifteen basis points between them is normal. Anyone quoting "the rate" to a client should say which series they mean and what week it covers.

What it means in Northeast Florida this week

A pending-sales reading is a leading indicator. NAR's own note on the index says contract activity parallels closed sales about two months out, so July contracts largely become September and October closings.

For a seller, the useful reading is Yun's second point rather than his first: homes are sitting longer and fewer buyers are bidding above asking. Our own realMLS records say the same thing from a different direction. In our look at how listings actually convert, published today, homes that advertised an assumable mortgage sat a median 67 cumulative days against 42 for other resale, and still closed at essentially the same share of original ask. Time on market is where this market expresses stress. Price is not, at least not yet.

For a buyer, a market with falling contract volume and stable prices is one where patience is worth more than speed, and where the negotiation is more likely to be about terms, repairs and closing costs than about the sticker.

What this does not mean

It does not mean Jacksonville is insulated. A 1.2% annual gain in one month, from a partner dataset, is a thin reed. It does not mean rates caused the July decline; that is Yun's attribution and it is plausible, not demonstrated. And it does not mean the pent-up demand argument will play out on any particular schedule. A 35-point gap between employment and contracts can close from either end.

People also ask

What are pending home sales, and why do they matter?

A pending home sale is one where the contract has been signed but the transaction has not closed. NAR's Pending Home Sales Index is built from a sample covering about 40% of multiple listing service data each month, and an index value of 100 equals the average level of contract activity in 2001. Because contracts usually close within one or two months, the index is a leading indicator: July's reading mostly tells you what September and October closings will look like.

Did pending home sales fall everywhere in July 2026?

Month over month, yes. All four major U.S. regions declined: the West 4.7%, the Northeast 2.0%, the South 2.2% and the Midwest 0.7%. Year over year the picture splits. The Midwest rose 1.7% while the Northeast fell 0.2%, the South 3.0% and the West 7.1%.

How did Florida metros perform in the July 2026 pending home sales report?

Two Florida metros appeared in NAR's list of the ten large metros with the biggest annual gains: Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach fifth at plus 2.4% and Jacksonville ninth at plus 1.2%. That is notable because their region declined 3.0% year over year. Those metro figures come from Realtor.com Economics data published alongside the NAR release rather than from the national index itself.

The takeaway

Contract signings hit their lowest point since January, the South was the second-weakest region in the country, and two Florida metros still made the national top ten for annual gains. The honest summary is that the state's headline story and its metro-level story are pointing in different directions this month, and one month is not enough to say which one wins.

Sources: National Association of Realtors, "NAR Pending Home Sales Report Shows 2.3% Decrease in July," August 18, 2026, read in full; metro rankings from Realtor.com Economics as published in that release. Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey, week ending August 20, 2026. Figures are as reported and are deemed reliable but not guaranteed.

Disclosure: Jon Brooks is a co-founder of Momentum Realty, a Florida real estate brokerage that owns and funds Florida Housing Intelligence. Momentum has a financial interest in Florida real estate transactions, including in markets named here. See our editorial standards.