Published October 2, 2026 in Market Update

Baytown is still tight, but buyers are taking a little more room to negotiate

By April Aberle

Real estate, Baytown/Crosby/Highlands Buy Box

Nationally, Redfin reported that 21.1% of home sellers cut their asking prices in the four weeks ending September 20. Realtor.com put price cuts at 20.8% of listings in September, the highest share since October 2022. Mortgage rates surged above 7% for the first time since January 2025, according to Realtor.com. That is the backdrop. Now here is what the Real Estate Data Aggregator counted in this buy box for the three months ending July 31, 2026.

The story is not the same in every ZIP code. Some parts of this market tightened up. Others softened a little. That gap matters if you are pricing a home right now.

Where inventory shrank the most

The Real Estate Data Aggregator counted 268 homes for sale in ZIP 77521 in the three months ending July 31, 2026. That is down 16.8% from the same months of 2025. ZIP 77523 fell 10.5% to 274 homes. ZIP 77520 dropped 11.1% to 136 homes. Fewer listings mean less competition for sellers, but buyers are still watching value closely.

ZIP 77532, which covers much of Crosby, moved the other way. The Real Estate Data Aggregator counted 444 homes for sale there, up 9.6% from a year before. New listings rose 23% to 487. More supply means buyers in that area have more choices and more room to negotiate.

Prices held up in most ZIPs, with one exception

ZIP 77532 is the one place where the median sale price slipped. The Real Estate Data Aggregator put it at $249,990, down 6.2% from the same months of 2025. More inventory and more new listings likely played a role. The sale-to-list ratio there was 94.9%, down 0.7 points from a year ago. Buyers in Crosby are getting a little more of what they ask for.

ZIP 77562, Highlands, told a different story. The median sale price rose 9% to $258,900, according to the Real Estate Data Aggregator. Homes there sold in a median of 33 days, 32 days faster than the same period last year. Nearly 1 in 4 homes went under contract within two weeks of listing, up 12.3 points year over year. That is a meaningful shift in pace.

How fast are homes selling?

ZIP 77523 had the longest median time on market at 67 days, up 10 days from a year ago. ZIP 77521 was 47 days, but that was 16 days longer than the same period in 2025. Homes are still selling, but some ZIPs are taking more time than they did last year. That is worth knowing before you pick a list price.

What buyers are actually paying versus list

A sale-to-list ratio of 94.9% in ZIP 77532 means buyers there are, on average, paying about 5 cents less per dollar of list price than the seller asked. That gap is not huge, but it is real. Price your home with that in mind.

The national context: rates and price cuts

Realtor.com reported that active listings nationally topped 1.16 million homes in September 2026. Mortgage rates moved above 7% for the first time since January 2025, according to Realtor.com. That slows buyers down everywhere. Redfin reported that 21.1% of U.S. sellers cut asking prices in the four weeks ending September 20. Locally, the Real Estate Data Aggregator shows prices mostly held, but the national pressure is real and buyers here feel it too.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency reported U.S. house prices rose 2.6% from July 2025 to July 2026. Most ZIPs in this buy box matched or beat that pace. ZIP 77562 at 9% and ZIP 77523 at 7.2% both ran well ahead of the national figure.

Supply: how many months of homes are out there?

ZIP 77520 sits at 6.1 months of supply. That is close to a balanced market. The other four ZIPs are all under 5 months, which still leans toward sellers. Even so, buyers in every ZIP are watching price carefully. A home priced over its value is sitting longer than it would have two years ago.

One more thing worth saying: the numbers above cover whole ZIP codes. One street, one block, or one home style can read very differently from the ZIP code average. If your home is in one of these areas and you want to know what the numbers mean for your specific address, the ask below is the fastest way to find out.