Published October 26, 2026 in Market Update

Sellers Are Still Getting 95 Cents on the Dollar. Here Is the Catch.

By Benjamin Melendez Nogueras

Real estate, Coachella Valley & Area MLS Data

I pulled every listing that sold in the Coachella Valley MLS, through October 7, 2026, and one number stopped me cold. There are 6.1 months of homes for sale right now. By the standard rule, anything over 6 months is a buyer's market. So I went looking for the leverage buyers are supposed to have, and what I found was more complicated than the headline suggests.

Yes, buyers have leverage, but it only shows up in one place

The 6.1-month supply is real. Nationally, the supply sits at 4.8 months, according to the National Association of Realtors. The Coachella Valley is above that line. By the textbook definition, that tips the market toward buyers.

But here is what the supply number does not tell you. The typical home that sold still closed at 95.3% of what it first asked. Across all 2,408 homes in this data, sellers gave up about 4.7 cents on the dollar from their first price. That is not nothing, but it is not a buyer's windfall either.

The leverage is not in the offer. It is in the wait. Look at what happens as time passes. Homes that sold in their first month got 98.8% of what they first asked. Homes that took five to six months got 89.7%. That is a 9.1 percentage point gap, and it belongs entirely to the buyer who waited.

The problem is that most buyers cannot wait six months for one home. And most sellers do not let it go that long without adjusting. The real question is where you are in that window when you make your move.

The leverage is real, but it is not the same at every price

Nearly 3 in 10 homes under $450,000 sold at or above their asking price. That share drops to 17.4% for homes priced at $1,100,000 and up. So if you are buying at the top of the market, you have more room. If you are buying under $450,000, you may be competing harder than the 6.1-month number suggests.

The mortgage rate makes this harder. The 30-year fixed rate averaged 7.32% as of October 22, 2026, up from 6.19% a year ago, according to Freddie Mac's weekly rate survey. That shift alone changes what a buyer can afford and how hard they push. Cash buyers, who made up 57.9% of tracked sales here, do not feel that the same way loan buyers do.

More than 1 in 3 sellers on the market today have already moved their price

Of the 1,971 homes for sale right now, 688 have already dropped their price. That is 34.9%. The typical cut is $29,925, which is 4.7% off where they started. The biggest single cut in the valley is $1,450,000, on Beryl Lane.

That matters for buyers because it means the negotiation has often already started before you walk in the door. A home that has been cut once is a seller who has already shown you something. It does not guarantee more room, but it tells you the first price was not the floor.

For sellers, the warning is the same number read backward. In September, 644 homes came on the market and only 143 found a buyer. That is 4.5 new listings for every new contract. Homes that price right from the start are the ones that sell in month one at 98.8% of asking. Homes that price high and wait are the ones that end up in the 34.9%.

What this means if you are buying or selling right now

If you are selling, the 6.1-month supply is not a reason to panic, but it is a reason to price honestly the first time. Homes that sold in month one got 98.8% of their first price. Homes that sat past five months got 89.7%. That gap is 9.1 percentage points. The sellers who got closest to full price were not the ones who held firm longest. They were the ones who priced where buyers were already looking.

If you are buying, the leverage is real but it is not automatic. Under $450,000, nearly 1 in 3 homes still sold at or over asking. At $1.1M and up, that drops to fewer than 2 in 10. Know your range before you decide how hard to push. And watch the homes that have already been cut. With 34.9% of active listings already reduced, and the National Association of Realtors reporting national sales down 2.2% year over year, the sellers still sitting on the market are carrying more pressure than the closed-sale numbers alone would show.