A Year Ago It Was $461,000. This Summer It's $495,000. Homes Still Take 99 Days.

Sit down at the kitchen table with last summer's price sheet next to this summer's, and the first thing you notice is the jump. A year ago, the median home across our whole territory sold for $461,000. This summer, over the twelve weeks ending August 30, that median reached $495,000, according to MLS sold data.

That's not a small move. It's real money, and it happened across a territory that runs from Blooming Grove down through Chester and Goshen to Middletown and Monroe.

Here's the part that should slow you down, though. Homes did not sell any faster to get there. The median days on market across the territory this period sat at 99 days. That's over three months of a home sitting on the market before it goes under contract, in the same window that pushed prices up meaningfully.

Usually we expect those two things to move together. Prices climb because buyers are competing hard and moving fast. Not this time. Buyers paid more, and they still took their time deciding.

Chester, NY tells the sharpest version of this story. There, the median sale price climbed 28% year over year, the biggest jump of any market we track. But sellers there are also giving up more ground at the table: the average sale-to-list ratio slipped by 1.4 percentage points compared with a year earlier. Homes in Chester are fetching more money, and sellers are conceding more to close the deal. Higher price, less leverage, at the same time.

That combination matters more than either number alone. It tells you this isn't a market where sellers can simply name a number and wait. It's a market where the eventual price can land high, but getting there still takes negotiation and patience.

Not every corner of the territory moves at the same pace, either. Median days to pending ran 100 days in Florida, NY this period. Just up the road in Highland Falls, the same measure ran 31 days. One buy box, two very different rhythms depending on exactly where you're standing.

If you're thinking about selling, the price trend is real and it's in your favor. But 99 days is the honest number to plan around, not a headline pace. Price for the market that actually exists on your street, and build in the time it takes to find the right buyer rather than the first one.

If you're buying, the longer runway is your friend. A 99-day median means there's room to look carefully, negotiate, and not feel rushed into a decision at the open house. That's worth something, even as prices sit higher than they did last summer.

What I'll be watching over the next few months: whether that 99-day figure holds steady or starts moving, and whether Chester's price gains hold up with sellers conceding as much ground as they have been. Those two threads, taken together, will tell us more about where this market is headed than either one alone.

This read comes from MLS sold data across the territory. If you want to talk through what it means for your specific street, I'm always glad to have that conversation.