Current real estate market trends

What’s actually happening in real estate right now

Every few months we sit down with a coffee and compare what we’re reading about the market to what we’re actually seeing around us on the Riviera, and 2026 has been an interesting year to do that exercise. Rates have come down from their painful 2023-2024 peak, buyers are timid but present, and the gap between what sellers want and what buyers will pay is finally starting to close in some places.

Mortgage rates have eased and home prices are broadly stabilising rather than falling further, both in France and in the US market that so much of the global commentary still focuses on. The picture isn’t uniform though, some regions are still correcting while others are already climbing again.

Key points in this article:

• French average mortgage rates and what they mean for buying power in 2026
• How the US market is expected to move this year according to the National Association of Realtors
• Why some regions are still falling while others rebound
• What this means if you’re thinking about buying or selling this year

Mortgage rates in France: the trend that changes everything

According to the Crédit Logement/CSA observatory, the average French mortgage rate stood around 3.12% on 15 years, 3.22% on 20 years and 3.30% on 25 years in June 2026, continuing a gentle decline from the peaks of 2023-2024. That’s a meaningful shift for anyone who paused a project two years ago when rates briefly touched 4%.

Your down payment still matters enormously. Banks generally ask for at least 10% of the purchase price as a personal contribution, which usually corresponds to notary fees and guarantee costs they won’t finance directly. Buyers who can put down 20% or more typically access rates 0.30 to 0.60 points lower than those financing with little to no deposit, a gap that adds up to thousands of euros over 20 years.

Home prices: stabilising more than dropping

The Notaires de France data for the first quarter of 2026 shows prices for existing homes across metropolitan France nearly flat year-on-year, around +0.2%, following +1% in the last quarter of 2025. Early estimates from pending sales suggest continued near-stability into the second half of the year, with houses lagging slightly behind apartments.

Regional variation remains the real story. Markets that corrected the most over the past few years, Bordeaux, Nantes, parts of the Paris suburbs, may still lose a few percent, while cities such as Marseille, mid-sized towns and rural areas are holding steady or edging up. Île-de-France logged its third consecutive quarter of growth, up 0.6% in Q1 2026.

Indicator	France, early-mid 2026
Average mortgage rate, 20 years	Around 3.22%-3.34%
Existing home prices, year-on-year	Roughly stable, +0.2%
Minimum down payment typically required	10% of purchase price
Notary fees, existing property	Around 7-8% of the price

Sources: Observatoire Crédit Logement/CSA and Notaires de France, data published in 2026.

Across the Atlantic: what NAR expects for 2026

Since so much of the international commentary on real estate still comes out of the US, it’s worth a look there too. The National Association of Realtors forecasts existing home sales rising around 14% nationwide in 2026, following a stagnant 2025, with new-home sales up roughly 5%. Prices are expected to climb about 4%, supported by continued job growth and persistent supply shortages rather than speculative demand.

Thirty-year fixed mortgage rates averaged around 6.47% in mid-June 2026, down from 6.81% a year earlier, a modest but real relief for buyers who’d been priced out at the higher end. NAR’s own forecast summit points to a “positive recovery” narrative for 2026, though affordability gaps persist regionally, coastal markets in particular remain expensive relative to local incomes.

Why regional variation matters more than any national headline

National averages flatten out a lot of what actually determines whether now is a good moment to buy or sell where you live. A market recovering nationally can still be soft in a specific neighbourhood if local supply is unusually high, and the reverse is just as true.

This is exactly why we’ve always been wary of national headlines when advising friends on timing a sale. What matters is local inventory, local demand, and how a specific property compares to what else is on the market nearby, not what a national index says this quarter.

Take a market like the San Francisco Bay Area, which keeps coming up in international commentary. Its tech industry pulls in high, stable incomes, and its housing supply has been structurally limited for years by geography and strict local zoning. Even when national mortgage rates rise, that combination of limited land and concentrated wealth tends to keep prices firmer there than almost anywhere else, though rising rates can still slow the pace of sales even in a supply-constrained market like this one.

The lesson generalises well beyond that one example. A market defined by genuine scarcity, whether that’s land, protected coastline, or planning restrictions, behaves differently from one where new construction can simply catch up with demand. On the Riviera, we see a smaller version of the same dynamic: the coastline is finite, so certain neighbourhoods hold their value even during the softer years elsewhere in the country.

If you’re weighing a purchase on the Riviera specifically rather than just watching national trends, we’ve put together a broader look at what to consider before investing in real estate here, which goes beyond pure market timing.

What this means if you’re buying or selling in 2026

For buyers, lower rates than 2023-2024 improve borrowing power, but a bigger down payment still buys a noticeably better rate, so it’s worth delaying a purchase by a few months to build that cushion if you’re close. For sellers, a broadly stable price environment means realistic pricing from day one matters more than ever, overpricing in a flat market just means a longer, more visible time on market.

There’s also the financing side to keep in mind, which too many buyers only consider once they’ve found a property. Pre-approval from a bank, even an informal one, tells you what you can actually afford before you fall in love with something out of reach. It also strengthens your position when negotiating, sellers take a financed offer more seriously when the buyer can prove the funding is already lined up rather than promised.

Renters watching the market from the sidelines shouldn’t ignore it either. A period of stabilising prices and easing rates is often when more properties come to market as sellers who’d been waiting for a better moment finally list, which can mean more genuine choice for buyers who’ve been patient over the past couple of years.

Frequently asked questions

Are mortgage rates expected to keep falling through 2026? Forecasts point to gradual easing rather than a sharp drop, both in France and the US, so waiting indefinitely for a much lower rate carries its own risk of missing a good property.

Is now a good time to sell? It depends entirely on your local market. A broadly stable national trend can hide a very active or very slow local one, so check recent comparable sales in your specific area before deciding.

Why does the Bay Area or similar tech hubs keep coming up in these reports? Persistent supply shortages combined with strong local income growth keep certain markets structurally more expensive than the national picture suggests, regardless of what’s happening with interest rates elsewhere.

This article reflects a general, non-professional reading of published market data, not personalised investment advice. For a decision specific to your situation, a notaire, real estate agent or mortgage broker remains the right point of contact.

Article updated in July 2026.