Hot Home Market

Dallas homes are flying off the market at this record-breaking pace

See a home you like? You'd better pounce.

Photo by Phillip Spears/Getty Images

The best time of the year to sell your home in Dallas is coming up quick, and buyers should be prepared to move extra fast this year. Zillow recently found that in 2017, homes all across the nation sold at their fastest pace on record: 81 days, and that includes the time to close the sale.

Texas' red-hot real estate market, however, is moving even quicker. In Dallas, homes stayed on the market an average of 55 days. During May and June, when homebuying here is at its peak, that number dropped to just 49 days.

It's nearly as fast and furious in Austin, where buyers have been scooping up homes in an average of 61 days (53 days in May). San Antonio's market is a little calmer at 73 days, but that's shortened to 66 days in June.

Only Houston is on par with the rest of the country, matching up exactly with the average 81 days. But during April and May, H-Town scorches the national "busy season" average of 73 days and has potential buyers scrambling to close the deal in only 65 days. Even Hurricane Harvey didn't have much of an impact on this — the average Houston timeframe in 2016 was 80 days.

Zillow attributes the overall crunch to tight inventory, as the number of homes for sale has fallen on a year-over-year basis for 37 consecutive months. Fewer options for buyers means higher prices, which led to nearly a quarter of all homes selling for over their list price in 2017.

In Dallas, though, inventory is up 15 percent over the last year, and 40 percent of homes sold for more than the asking price last year.

Closing can generally take four to six weeks, which means the typical home sits on the market for around 30 days before going under contract. The fastest selling market in 2017 was San Jose, California, where the typical home sold in 41 days. San Jose also experienced the biggest drop in inventory over the past year, with 26.8 percent fewer homes to choose from than a year earlier. Homes in San Jose sold fastest in October 2017, with a span of just 39 days from listing to closing.

Among major metro areas, New York took the most days to sell: 134. That shortened to 122 during July, its fastest month.

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homebuying news

Texas ranks among the top 20 markets for homebuyers under 35

Photo by Vitaly Gariev on Unsplash

In 2025, Texas had more mortgage applicants under 35 years old than any other state in the country, the report found.

The Lone Star State is emerging as a top destination for young adult homebuyers, a new report has confirmed, with nearly 23 percent of all mortgage applications submitted by individuals under 35 years old.

Texas ranked No. 18 in SmartAsset's new study, "Where Young Adults are House Hunting," making it one of the most sought-after U.S. states "where the next generation of homeowners may be gaining the strongest foothold."

To determine where younger Americans are most actively pursuing homeownership, SmartAsset's analysts examined mortgage application data in all 50 states in 2025, and calculated the share of applications filed by buyers younger than 35 relative to all applicants.

A total 259,737 Texas homebuyers under 35 submitted mortgage applications in the last year alone — making Texas the state with the highest number of young adult applications in the country.

California and Florida, respectively, had the second- and third-highest numerical rate of young adult homebuyers with 170,434 and 159,429 applications in each state. But they still ranked at the bottom of the national list with the lowest percentage of young adult applications relative to all applicants in 2025 — at 14.7 and 14.8 percent.

North Dakota leads the nation as the top state for young homeowners with over 28 percent of all mortgage applications in 2025 submitted by homebuyers under 35, making up 6,551 applications.

SmartAsset also revealed something many homeowners might already know: younger Americans are more likely to pursue homeownership in states with lower housing costs.

"In each of the four states with the highest share of mortgage applications from adults younger than 35, the typical home value is less than $300,000: North Dakota (No. 1), West Virginia (No. 2), Nebraska (No. 3) and Iowa (No. 4)," the report's author wrote.

In Texas, the typical home is worth $302,187, which is the 18th highest in the U.S. Meanwhile, West Virginia and Mississippi are the only two states with home values under $200,000, the lowest nationwide.

Young potential homebuyers looking for a home in Dallas need to make about $83,000 to afford a starter home. Many surrounding suburbs also have high appeal for first-time homebuyers, such as McKinney and Plano, which offer a high quality of life for homeowners that want to start a family.

High home prices aren't the only challenges keeping young Americans from becoming homeowners, the report said. Other challenges like high interest rates and limited supply are also plaguing would-be homebuyers.

"According to a recent Pew Research Center survey, nearly 9 in 10 younger Americans say it is harder for them to buy a home than it was for their parents," the report said. "Nonetheless, younger buyers continue to aspire to homeownership, navigating an uneven landscape of affordability and opportunity."

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