May 3, 2026
May 3, Sunday Open Homes List.
We’re happy to provide a complete list of *all Inner-East Bay open homes for today, please click here.
*The specific cities and districts covered in this market analysis report are Berkeley, Oakland, Piedmont, Albany, Kensington, El Cerrito, Richmond, El Sobrante, Pinole, Hercules, and Crockett.
What I’m seeing in the market this week.
Although I shared the graphs last week, I didn’t have the time to add my usual commentary. In the two weeks since my last update, the story has shifted, and it’s falling in line with the defining theme of 2026: low inventory.
The typical spring pattern was starting to take shape. We expect to see inventory build steadily week over week into early June. Instead, that trend has reversed, at least in Berkeley and Richmond. Oakland is telling a slightly different story, with active inventory ticking up, but with a problematic twist. Homes are not going under contract at a pace that keeps the market in balance, so that added supply is not translating into real momentum in every neighborhood.
Even with Oakland’s divergence, overall inventory remains more than 30% below where we were this time last year. That’s why even a modest uptick in “Coming Soon” activity is encouraging. It suggests that more listings may be on the way as we move toward what should be the seasonal peak in spring inventory.
All of this is unfolding against a volatile macro backdrop. Conflict in the Middle East is pushing oil prices higher, unsettling financial markets, and making mortgage rate forecasts even less predictable than usual.
And yet, on the ground, very little has changed. Inventory is still tight. Demand is still strong. That imbalance continues to hold a firm floor under prices, even with pressure from higher rates.
Micro market note: El Sobrante has bucked the low inventory trend this year, with softer demand, though the pace of homes going into contract has picked up in the past two weeks.
El Cerrito appears to be at a high water mark for inventory, with some higher end listings lingering.
Albany is also seeing elevated inventory, but without meaningful price softness. Demand remains strong and the market stays competitive.
If you are focused on a specific city or neighborhood, reach out and we can talk strategy.
Opportunities
Older listings that have been passed over and are now sitting represent real opportunities for buyers. This is where leverage lives right now. If you’re curious, reach out and let’s dig in.
The Big 3: Oakland, Berkeley, Richmond
I’ve included last year’s active listing counts alongside this year’s for Oakland, Berkeley, and Richmond to show how inventory has changed year over year. For detailed information on cities not highlighted below please reach out to me directly.
Note about Berkeley: Proposed point of sale changes to Berkeley’s BESO point-of-sale ordinance are now in effect. 🎧Click here to listen to a short conversation about the changes. Zone Zero Defensible Space rules are now in effect for Berkeley, with enforcement to roll-out in July 🎧Click here for a conversation with Assistant Berkeley Fire Chief Colin Arnold about the changes.
Pro Tip: Reach out to us to learn about, and to discuss homes that are sitting on the market longer than is healthy for their bottom line and where a deal might exist for you. It’s always a good time of year for deals on property that have not successfully found a buyer within 3 weeks of being on the market.
Mortgage rates
Mortgage rates in the 6% to 6.5% range are likely the baseline for 2026, an improvement from recent years, and buyers are not locked in forever since they can refinance if rates fall. As rates ease, home values often rise, while each payment builds equity through loan paydown. When you combine potential appreciation, principal reduction, and the option to refinance, ownership tends to compound over time, which is a key reason homeowners reliably build more wealth over time than renters .
For more detail, see the “Let’s Talk About Mortgage Rates” section below.
Oakland accounts for 60% of all Sunday open house listings across the Inner East Bay, consistent with the 56% two month average. That share underscores Oakland’s size and density, and the fact that most transactions in the Inner East Bay happen there.
Let’s Get Granular: Oakland, Berkeley, Richmond
Included below is the average price for a specific type of single family home over the past two weeks, compared to this time last year. Days on Market (DOM) is included because longer selling times tend to align with softer year over year values.
Here’s the market activity for Oakland over the past 2 months for single family detached homes.
The 2 month chart has been approximately in line with seasonality and our expectations of the market for this time of year, though new listings are slower to come to market than in March. I am a little disturbed to see a fall-off in homes going under contract as inventory increases. This is not generally a healthy pattern. Please reach out to understand which neighborhoods in Oakland are getting stuck. Demand in Oakland is generally quite strong for well priced, well located, and well presented properties continuing to move reasonably quickly. I’m also seeing renewed momentum in Rockridge and Temescal, with demand beginning to rebound after a quieter stretch in 2025.
Inflation pressures and geopolitical uncertainty are, for now, being tempered by a simple but powerful dynamic of constrained supply meeting strong demand. There’s terrific variation in trends between neighborhoods with higher value neighborhoods out-performing lower value neighborhoods and the market above $1M is moving with greater ease than the sub-$1M market. Similar to the Berkeley Hills, fire insurance is also affecting demand in neighborhoods with greater fire risk.
Active Inventory Now vs Same Time Last Year:
Number of Available Single Family Homes in Oakland this weekend = 376
Number of Available Single Family Homes in Oakland this weekend in 2025 = 512
Average Sold Price vs Same Time Last Year:
Avg. Sold Price for Single Family Homes in Oakland (2/2-3/3) past 2 weeks = $1,039,325 (30 DOM)
Avg. Sold Price for SFH in Oakland (2/2-3/3) same 2 weeks 2025 = $1,032,151 (32 DOM)
Here’s the market activity for Berkeley over the past 2 months for single family detached homes.
Berkeley’s market has been intensely competitive so far this year, with multiple offers the norm for well priced, well located, and well presented homes. It is increasingly a tale of two markets: In the Flats, including central, north, and northwest Berkeley, prices are commonly landing between $1,200 and $1,400+ or more per square foot*, while in the Hills, particularly within Very High Fire Hazard Zones, values drop closer to around +/-$750 per square foot, creating a clear divide. Demand in the Flats remains relentless, and after a normal seasonal pattern in April the past week has seen a fall-off in active inventory as homes go quickly under contract. The pattern is clear: the best homes still fly off the shelf, while everything else lingers, particularly in the Hills, where the pause prior to homes going under contract is more pronounced. *It’s also worth noting that price per square foot typically declines as home size increases, with the highest value generally concentrated in the first 1000 square feet.
Active Inventory Now vs Same Time Last Year:
Number of Available Single Family Homes in Berkeley this weekend = 69
Number of Available Single Family Homes in Berkeley this weekend in 2025 = 95
Average Sold Price vs Same Time Last Year:
Avg. Sold Price for Single Family Homes in Berkeley (2/2-3/3) past 2 weeks = $1,654,027 (21 DOM)
Avg. Sold Price for SFH in Berkeley (2/2-3/3) same 2 weeks 2025 = $1,493,750 (20 DOM)
Here’s the market activity for Richmond over the past 2 months for single family detached homes.
Inventory levels are well behind the same time last year - 48% Y-o-Y. Similar to Berkeley, the graph highlights an extraordinary dynamic: active inventory declining in March when it should have been rising. Following a normal seasonal pattern in April the past week has seen a fall-off in active inventory as homes go quickly under contract. A simple pattern persists however where the most desirable homes sell quickly, followed by a slowdown as remaining listings take longer to find buyers.
That’s reflected in the data too: Average Days on Market (DOM) for Richmond has increased from the 80’s into the 90’s in the past 2 weeks..
Note: Buyers are jumping quickly on the best of the new inventory, especially in coveted areas like Richmond North & East, where one property received 18 offers, and The Annex, where a listing received 24 offers, and home values are climbing past anything we saw last year.
Active Inventory Now vs Same Time Last Year:
Number of Available Single Family Homes in Richmond this weekend = 69
Number of Available Single Family Homes in Richmond this weekend in 2025 = 151
Average Sold Price vs Same Time Last Year:
Avg. Sold Price for Single Family Homes in Richmond (2/2-3/3) past 2 weeks = $700,333 (20 DOM)
Avg. Sold Price for SFH in Richmond (2/2-3/3) same 2 weeks 2025 = $732,500 (21 DOM)
Condos & Townhomes
Days on market for Condos & Townhomes is longer than for Single Family Homes by quite a bit. The average days on market (DOM) for condos is 80 and DOM for townhouses in the Inner East Bay is currently 61. That’s a few days longer than last week but considerably better than a couple of months ago. Cancellations are a factor too though, and once listings hit about 90 DOM they begin to cancel. More information on cancellations is available below.
It's a great time to shop for a condo or townhouse in almost any part of the Inner East Bay. Most real estate agents will tell you that in a market downturn, condos and townhouses are the last residential property category to recover. Single family homes tend historically to recover value more quickly following a market downturn. Due to inventory constraints this year it seems that the Inner East Bay single family home market has generally hit its floor and logically that should mean the floor for condos is imminent.
What are the causes shaping the problematic condo market in recent years?
I dropped a podcast episode in May 2025 dealing specifically with the Inner East Bay condo market. The content remains relevant to this day and we have recorded a podcast update on the same topic to be released next week 🎧Click here to listen to MAY 2025.
Open Homes for Sunday, May 3: Let’s break it down
Of the 258 single family residential homes that have an open house 2% had a price adjustment. The list of price adjusted property is always worth a glance, click here to see it. Price adjusted property represents an opportunity and so do canceled listings. See below for more information on cancellations.
Of the 108 condos/townhouses that have an open house, 10% had price adjustment in the past week. Click here for the list of price adjusted listings. In all parts of the Inner East Bay condos have lost value, a downward trend that started mid-2024 is continuing. The list of price adjusted property is always worth a glance. There are significant opportunities in the current condo market in most East Bay cities for potential buyers, and despite getting a bad rap they can be the perfect solution and investment when properly investigated.
Listings canceled from the Multiple Listing Service in the past 7 days
Cancellations are on the low side at this time of year, consistent with historical data.
Cancellations reveal that sellers are pulling underperforming or mispriced listings from the market, if they can afford to, in favor of possibly re-listing them perhaps later in the year, or, in some cases, renting them. Cancellations are also an opportunity for buyers because the sellers may still be open to offers, although it’s not unusual for these sellers to have unrealistic expectations. The list is worth reviewing. Click here for a full list from over the past 1 week.
Coming Soon
Click here for a list of 53 East Bay* properties listed as Coming Soon, this represents the highest number we’ve seen this year and bodes well for the May and early June market, usually peak inventory for the Spring market. Only a small number of properties are actively marketed as Coming Soon to test the market. The average number of Coming Soon’s for the past 4 weeks is 43. ‘Coming Soon’ listings are hidden from consumer searches of public sites but they are mostly available to view by appointment. Please reach out to us if any of them seem interesting or noteworthy.
Let’s Talk About Mortgage Rates
Fannie Mae forecast in a press release on September 23 that mortgage rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages would end at 6.4% in 2025 and at 5.9% in 2026. This is generally in line with a forecast by the Mortgage Bankers Association in late October that rates in 2026 would remain between 6% to 6.5%.
How’s That Working Out?
In January 2026, Trump announced a plan to buy $200 billion in mortgage-backed securities through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to help push rates lower, similar to past Federal Reserve efforts. Rates on a 30yr fixed rate mortgage briefly fell just below 6% for the first time in years, but the impact did not last. Rising geopolitical tensions, including conflict with Iran and concerns around oil prices, have pushed rates above 6.5% in the past month but we are now broadly in line with forecasts of 6% to 6.5% for 2026, actually ending at 6.3% this week. The swings along the way have been significant. Continued conflict may move everything completely out of whack with forecasts if oil prices continue to climb.
What drives rates?
Here’s how it works: Federal Reserve rate cuts do not directly correlate to reduced mortgage interest rates. As more seasoned mortgage rate watchers know, a better way to understand the direction of mortgage rates is to track the yield on the 10-year Treasury bond. Same direction trend: When the yield on the 10-year Treasury note moves down, average interest rates—especially for things like mortgages, business loans, and other long-term borrowing—tend to move down as well. 10-year yield ↓ → borrowing rates generally ↓ also. The 10-year yield is used as a proxy for mortgage rates. The 10-year Treasury bond yield is the interest rate the U.S. government pays to borrow money for a decade, serving as a benchmark for other interest rates and a key indicator of investor sentiment about economic conditions. Caveat: The bond market behaved outside of normal in 2025 due to government policy, and 2025’s Big Beautiful Bill adds $3 trillion+ to the deficit. The effects on the bond market remain to be seen in the fullness of time.
For those of you who want a deeper dive into the mortgage rate environment I have a couple of podcast suggestions for you:
Most recently (Feb 6, 2026) I dropped a podcast with Brady Thomas, owner of LaSalle Mortgage to discuss how obsessing over rate shopping can be a costly distraction. Brady cuts through mortgage-rate myths, explains what actually drives rates, and why lender credibility with listing agents often matters more than a teaser quote. The episode offers a clear case for preparation and positioning as the market recalibrates toward 2026.🎧Click here to listen to “Why Rate Shopping Might Be A Bum Steer: Real Lending Insights From Brady Thomas”.
I sat down on September 19, 2025, to podcast with mortgage advisor Evelyn Freitas to dissect how the Federal Reserve Board of Governors operates, what’s influencing it now, and how administration pressure may influence it in the next 1 to 2 years. 🎧Click here to listen to “Navigating the September 17 Fed Rate Cut”.
I also find this weekly newsletter from Faramarz-Moeen-Ziai extremely useful. Bottom line in his newsletter this week: Mortgage Rates Jumped This Week, But Found a Ceiling. To hear Faramarz speak in his own words on an April 20 podcast 🎧Click here to listen to “Mortgage Market Reality Check”.
That’s the wrap up for this weekend!
Thinking about buying or selling in the East Bay?
Declan Spring is the lead agent at The Home Factor, a real estate team focused on helping clients navigate Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and surrounding communities.
Learn more at:
thehomefactor.com
Please don’t hesitate to reach out for custom information. We’re always happy to provide it. Best way to reach us is at declan@thehomefactor.com
Declan Spring is a licensed CA REALTOR® DRE#01398898