Redfin put the median U.S. home sale price at $398,596 for August 2026, up 2.20 percent from August 2025. The figure comes from the brokerage’s monthly housing-market data and covers closed sales of every home type across the full calendar month, so it records what buyers actually paid rather than what sellers asked.
It lands in a market where prices are still creeping higher while a record share of sellers is trimming asking prices. Three other measures of the same market, from Redfin, the Census Bureau and the National Association of Realtors, describe different parts of the story and cannot be swapped for one another.
A $398,596 median on closed sales, up 2.20 percent
Redfin’s U.S. housing market page lists the August median sale price at $398,596 and a year-over-year gain of 2.2 percent, and the data summary on its news page gives the same number as 2.20 percent. The page labels the data as all home types, drawn from MLS and public-record sales, for the calendar month of August. A median is the midpoint: half of the homes that closed sold for less than $398,596 and half for more.
The same Redfin page shows 1,534,918 homes for sale nationwide, up 2.7 percent from a year earlier, and a supply of four months. A 2.2 percent annual price gain is a modest one, and it arrives alongside a growing stock of unsold homes rather than a shortage of them.
Why a median sale price is not an asking price
Three distinctions decide whether the $398,596 is being read correctly. It is a sale price, so it reflects negotiated outcomes, including any cuts and concessions, not the list price on a listing. It is a median, so it moves when the mix of homes that sell shifts toward cheaper or pricier metros and property types, not only when individual homes gain or lose value. And it is a calendar-month figure, not a rolling window.
That last point matters because Redfin also publishes weekly reports measured over four weeks. In its September 30 report, Redfin found that 21.1 percent of U.S. home sellers cut their asking price in the four weeks ending September 20, up from 19.8 percent a year earlier and the highest share for that time of year in Redfin’s records, which begin in 2022. The monthly median and the four-week price-cut share are different instruments, measured over different periods, and neither one restates the other.
Asad Khan, a senior economist at Redfin, said in that report that sellers who sell quickly are the ones getting savvier about pricing from day one. The comment points at the gap between the price a seller hopes for and the price a buyer pays, and that gap is what a sale-price median captures after the fact.
Redfin, Census and Realtors: three medians in three universes
The Census Bureau’s new residential sales release for August put the median price of a new single-family house sold at $393,700, up from $392,200 in July but 5.8 percent below August 2025. New construction is a separate universe from the market Redfin measures, and the two medians moved in opposite directions on the year: Redfin’s up 2.20 percent, Census’s down 5.8 percent.
The National Association of Realtors, in its August existing-home sales report, put the median existing-home price at $429,100, up 1.6 percent from $422,400 a year earlier. That is about $30,500 higher than Redfin’s median. The gap does not mean either source is wrong. The two organizations count different universes of sales and assemble their medians from different baskets of homes, so the levels are not comparable even though both describe resale prices.
Where the series agree is direction and scale. Existing-home prices are rising by low single digits in both Redfin’s and NAR’s data, while Census shows new-home prices lower than a year ago.
What the August median does and does not say about affordability
The median is a level, and level alone does not measure affordability. Affordability depends on incomes and on the interest rate attached to the mortgage, and neither is part of the Redfin dataset. NAR’s chief economist, Lawrence Yun, attributed the August dip in existing-home sales to high mortgage rates, saying rates and home sales move in opposite directions.
What the Redfin figures do establish is the price a typical buyer paid in August: $398,596, with sellers conceding more at the margin as the price-cut share climbs. Whether that is a better or worse deal than a year ago depends on the financing terms, which the monthly data do not report. The next Redfin monthly update, covering September, will show whether the 2.20 percent annual gain holds as the record price-cut share works through to closed sales.
Redfin’s August reading rests on its own published series: $398,596 for the month, 2.20 percent above a year earlier, measured on every home type sold in the calendar month.
How the August sale-price median fits a wider housing budget
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Drafted with AI help, this report’s prices, percentages and dates were checked against Redfin, Census and NAR pages read on October 4, 2026.
Warren Cohen is a finance writer based in Phoenix, Arizona, covering personal finance topics including credit, banking, and beginner investing. He earned his degree in business administration from Arizona State University and began his career working in consumer finance, where he gained direct experience with lending and credit systems. He now writes for personal finance websites and fintech platforms, focusing on clear, practical content that helps readers make informed financial decisions.
