After six years of relentless increases, Maine home sale prices finally decreased last month. It’s a welcome change of course after 72 straight months of year-over-year rises and real estate agents say there are signs of a more balanced market ahead. But others caution that one month of good news does not mean the crisis is over.

Maine home buyers paid a median of $376,260 in March, just shy of a 1% dip compared to the same time last year, according to data released Thursday by the Maine Association of Realtors. The median is the price at which half of the homes sold for more and half sold for less.

Home sale prices have been steadily decreasing each month since December’s median of $400,000. But the last year-over-year decrease was in March 2019, when prices fell 0.94% to $200,000.

Meanwhile, 848 houses changed hands last month — a more than 12% increase over the prior month but a roughly 6% drop from March 2024.

January, February and March are typically the state’s quietest months for home buying and selling.

But the busy spring market is ramping up, and according to Jeff Harris, president of the Maine Association of Realtors, it could finally spell good news for buyers.

“We’re seeing the inventory of homes for sale inch upward with nearly 14% more homes on the market in March 2025 compared to March of last year,” he said in a prepared statement.

The increased inventory also means that sales are slowing down, with the average Maine home staying on the market for 22 days, up from 15 days last March. Last year, during the warmer months, homes spent less than a week on the market.

“For many markets, the pace is becoming more reasonable for buyers,” said Harris, who is also a broker with Harris Real Estate in Farmington.

But it’s not a buyer’s market yet. Statewide, there is a 3.6-month supply of unsold inventory, Harris said in an interview. A balanced market is a six-month supply.

“There’s so many buyers out there looking for something more affordable,” he said.

NOT YET A TREND

Paul McKee, the Maine association’s immediate past president, said he’s glad to see prices decrease but cautioned against jumping to conclusions.

“We need things to slow down price-wise. That’s good,” he said. “But there’s always an anomaly somewhere. Until you get a couple of months of this, it’s still one snapshot. … I’m glad to see it but I wouldn’t call it a trend.”

In a month with fewer than 1,000 sales, it doesn’t take much to skew the numbers, he said. For example, there could have been an $8 million sale last year that didn’t happen this year, thus dropping the average.

Michael Sosnowski, co-owner of Maine Home Connection, stressed that while prices have been decreasing, there’s no sign of a market crash.

“It’s more of a stabilization,” he said. “There’s been this phenomenon of price increase fatigue. Where we were was unsustainable.”

While houses may be sitting on the market for longer, on average, competition is still hot, particularly for houses priced below $500,000 in southern Maine.

Sosnowski said a property listed for around $350,000 in Gray recently had about 30 offers.

“Under $500,000, there’s not much different than there was a year ago,” he said. “There’s just not enough properties that are affordable.”

PRICES UP NATIONALLY, REGIONALLY

Maine’s slight price drop bucked national and regional trends.

Nationally, prices increased about 3% to a median sale price of $408,000, according to the National Association of Realtors. Sales, however, fell just over 2%

Regionally, sales were flat in the Northeast, but prices jumped more than 7% to a median of $468,000.

Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the national association, said March’s sluggish sales were a reflection of high mortgage rates and ongoing affordability challenges.

Interest rates have hovered around 7% for the last year or so. Thursday, the average rate for a 30-year loan was 6.81%, according to mortgage buyer Freddie Mac.

“Residential housing mobility, currently at historical lows, signals the troublesome possibility of less economic mobility for society,” Yun said.

SALES, PRICES A MIXED BAG

The Maine Association of Realtors also looks at three months of data in county-by-county comparisons to get a larger sample size of sale transactions.

The median price increased just over 5% to $382,353 between Jan. 1 and March 31 compared to the same three-month span the year before.

Cumberland County held its spot as Maine’s most expensive county with a median sale price of $550,000. York County was the second-most expensive, with a median sale price of $495,000. Cumberland County saw prices increase by about 3% from the year before, but similar to the statewide trend, York recorded its first decrease — 0.80% — since the three-month span between January and March 2019.

Aroostook County remained the state’s most affordable county, with a median sale price of $143,550. Washington County, with a median of $199,900, was the only other county with a sale price below $200,000.

Prices increased the most in Hancock County, which saw a 15.6% increase, while they had the steepest drop — about 14% — in Piscataquis County.

Sales were flat in Washington County, but they increased a whopping 81.6% in Waldo County, with 49 sales between January and March last year and 89 over the same period this year.

Androscoggin’s 21% drop in sales was the sharpest in the state.