Whether Maryland is a buyer’s market or a seller’s market shows up in a handful of published numbers: months of supply, days on market, pending sales, new listings and price cuts. Read them against the same month a year earlier, county by county, and the balance becomes clear. In August 2026, Maryland had 3.0 months of inventory, down from 3.5 a year earlier, according to Maryland REALTORS, while NAR’s national figure was 4.9 months (National Association of REALTORS). The two are calculated differently, as explained below, so treat the state-versus-nation gap as a rough guide.
No single number settles it, and the answer can differ a few miles apart. This guide explains what each signal measures, where Maryland publishes it, and how to read it, using the August 2026 releases, the newest available when this was written, as a worked example. For the latest read, see our Fall 2026 Maryland housing market update.
Key Takeaways
- Months of supply measures how long current listings would take to sell at the recent sales pace; a rising number means more choice for buyers.
- Maryland REALTORS reported 3.0 months of inventory statewide in August 2026; NAR’s national figure, calculated differently, was 4.9 months.
- Compare each figure with the same month a year earlier, since NAR says month-to-month median price comparisons don’t account for seasonality.
- Counties diverge: Howard County had 1.6 months of inventory in August 2026 and Baltimore City 4.7, in the Maryland REALTORS table.
What makes it a buyer’s market or a seller’s market?
A market tilts toward buyers when homes outnumber the buyers ready to make offers, and toward sellers when buyers outnumber homes. NAR puts it in one measure: months’ supply, “the number of months it would take to exhaust the total inventory at the current sales pace” (NAR, August 2026 existing-home sales).
When that number climbs, buyers get more choice and more room to negotiate. In NAR’s August 2026 report, its chief economist said the national supply of 4.9 months, its highest level in over ten years, was “giving homebuyers better opportunities to negotiate.” When it falls, competition for each listing tightens.
You’ll see rules of thumb that put an exact number on where buyer’s territory begins. None of the publishers below states one, so this guide sticks to direction: is supply rising or falling, and how does your county compare with the state and the nation?
Which five numbers should you watch?
Five published signals cover most of the picture. Each one comes from a source you can check yourself.
- Months of supply or inventory. How long the current listings would last at the recent sales pace. Higher means more choice for buyers.
- Days on market or days to contract. How long homes take to sell. Rising times suggest buyers are slowing down.
- Pending sales. Homes under contract that haven’t closed yet. They show what buyers are doing now, before closings catch up.
- New listings versus active listings. New listings show sellers entering; active listings show what’s piling up unsold.
- Price decreases. The share of active listings that cut their price. More cuts suggest sellers are meeting buyers where they are.
Median price is useful too, but read it carefully. NAR notes that “the only valid comparisons for median prices are with the same period a year earlier due to seasonality in buying patterns” (NAR). So compare August with last August, not with July.
Where does Maryland publish these numbers?
Three publishers cover Maryland, and each counts a little differently.
Maryland REALTORS publishes monthly statewide and county tables using Bright MLS data (Maryland REALTORS, Housing Statistics). In its tables, “Units” are sales settled that month, “Pending Units” are homes under contract that will settle later, and “Active Inventory” is homes still on the market. Its Months of Inventory uses current active inventory against the average of the current month and the previous 11 months of sales, a 12-month sales average (Maryland REALTORS, August 2026 Housing Statistics). It also estimates each county’s median price itself, because Bright doesn’t provide that level of detail.
Bright MLS publishes a monthly housing market report and county-level metro reports (Bright MLS, August 2026 Housing Market Report), plus a weekly snapshot. The weekly report defines Median Days to Contract as the median days from a listing’s MLS publication to going under contract, and tracks the share of active listings with a price decrease during the week (Bright MLS, weekly market report).
NAR publishes national existing-home sales each month, the benchmark for comparing Maryland with the country.
One caution: these figures get revised. Maryland REALTORS notes that its data are “revised on a regular basis” and older reports aren’t adjusted (August 2026 Housing Statistics). Compare figures within the same report, not across old editions. If you want to know where listing data comes from in the first place, our guide to Bright MLS, Zillow and Realtor.com explains it.
What did August 2026 look like in Maryland?
In August 2026, the Maryland REALTORS figures showed a market tighter than a year earlier, with less supply than NAR’s national figure, while Bright MLS’s Baltimore metro figures showed supply rising (below). This is the Maryland REALTORS table for the state and four Baltimore-area jurisdictions, August 2026 versus August 2025 (Maryland REALTORS, August 2026 Housing Statistics):
| Area | Months of inventory | Median days on market | Median sales price | Units sold |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Maryland | 3.0 (3.5 in Aug 2025) | 17 (16) | $445,000 (+2.3%) | 5,582 (-8.5%) |
| Howard County | 1.6 (2.7) | 9 (10) | $640,000 (-0.8%) | 330 (+7.8%) |
| Anne Arundel County | 2.2 (2.5) | 11 (13) | $507,000 (+1.3%) | 615 (-12.1%) |
| Baltimore County | 2.3 (2.7) | 14 (13) | $390,000 (+6.8%) | 687 (-10.5%) |
| Baltimore City | 4.7 (5.0) | 24 (21) | $225,000 (-8.2%) | 530 (-19.9%) |
Howard County had the lowest months of inventory of any Maryland jurisdiction in the full Maryland REALTORS table, and Baltimore City had the highest of these five at 4.7 months. Statewide, the same table shows new listings falling to 6,249 from 8,177 a year earlier, so fewer sellers were coming to market.
Bright MLS tells a different inventory story
Bright MLS’s own Baltimore metro report for the same month shows active listings up 14.7% from a year earlier, with months of supply at 2.72 versus 2.35 (Bright MLS, Baltimore Metro report, August 2026). By county, it put Howard at 1.66 months, Anne Arundel at 2.14, Baltimore County at 2.28 and Baltimore City at 4.69.
In Anne Arundel County, Baltimore County and Baltimore City, that’s the opposite direction from the Maryland REALTORS table, which shows active inventory down from a year earlier; Howard County fell in both. The two publishers’ August levels sit close together (Anne Arundel’s active inventory, for example, was 1,344 in the Maryland REALTORS table and 1,320 in Bright’s report). They part ways on the year-ago figure, so compare each publisher with its own year-ago number.
Bright explained its numbers this way. New listings fell because “most home sellers are also home buyers,” yet active listings rose “as a result of fewer buyers making offers and homes remaining on the market longer” (Bright MLS, Baltimore Metro report). Across its whole service area, Bright said inventory grew because of fewer buyers making offers, “rather than more sellers listing their homes for sale” (Bright MLS, August 2026 report).
The weekly view
Weekly data moves sooner. For the week ending October 4, 2026, Bright’s Baltimore metro snapshot showed 574 new purchase contracts, down 16.7% from a year earlier, and a median time to contract of 36 days, up 5 days. Active listings were up 19.7%, and 11.4% of active listings had a price decrease that week, down 0.1 percentage point from a year earlier (Bright MLS, weekly market report).
How do mortgage rates fit in?
Rates shape how many buyers can act. For the week of October 1, 2026, Freddie Mac’s survey put the 30-year fixed rate at 7.28%, up from 6.34% a year earlier (Freddie Mac, Primary Mortgage Market Survey). Read rates alongside the supply numbers: Bright’s August reports tied rising inventory to fewer buyers making offers, not to more sellers listing.
How do official analysts describe a market?
Federal housing analysts don’t reduce a market to one label either. HUD’s analysts described the Baltimore-area sales market as “tight but easing” as of September 1, 2023, citing 1.5 months of for-sale inventory and an estimated sales vacancy rate (HUD, Baltimore-Columbia-Towson Housing Market Profile). Earlier that year, HUD called the metro “tight but easing” while describing the Baltimore City submarket as “slightly soft,” with a 2.0-month supply (HUD, Comprehensive Housing Market Analysis).
Those are dated examples, not current readings. The lesson still holds: the city and the suburbs can read differently in the same month.
What should buyers and sellers do with these numbers?
Use them to set expectations, then check the specific neighborhood.
If you’re buying: rising months of supply, longer days to contract and more price cuts mean more room to negotiate on price and terms. In Maryland, who pays the transfer and recordation taxes is usually negotiable: the law presumes buyer and seller split them equally unless the contract says otherwise. One exception: when the buyer is a first-time Maryland home buyer who will live in the home, the law puts the state transfer tax on the seller outright. The seller also pays the recordation and local transfer tax, unless the contract expressly says otherwise (Md. Code, Real Property §14-104). Our Maryland transfer tax guide shows the math. Our buyer resources cover the steps.
If you’re selling: lower supply and fast days on market support firmer pricing, but watch the direction of change, not just the level. Our Maryland pricing guide and seller resources show how to set a price that fits the data. For a past snapshot to compare against, see our Summer 2026 market update.
Either way: county figures can hide big differences between ZIP codes and neighborhoods, and the monthly reports cited here stop at the county level. Ask an agent to pull the MLS numbers for the ZIP code you’re watching. To talk through what the data means for a specific move, contact Next Step Realty.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Maryland a buyer’s or seller’s market right now?
It depends on the county and the month. In August 2026, Maryland REALTORS reported 3.0 months of inventory statewide, down from 3.5 a year earlier, while the national figure was 4.9 months. Howard County was the tightest at 1.6 months; Baltimore City had 4.7. Check the latest monthly release for your county.
What does months of supply mean in real estate?
It’s how long the current inventory would take to sell at the recent sales pace. NAR describes it as the months needed “to exhaust the total inventory at the current sales pace.” Maryland REALTORS calculates it from active inventory and a 12-month average of sales. A rising figure means more choice for buyers.
Where can I find Maryland housing market data?
Maryland REALTORS publishes monthly statewide and county tables from Bright MLS data. Bright MLS publishes monthly market reports, county-level metro reports and a weekly snapshot. NAR publishes national existing-home sales each month. These reports stop at the county level; for a ZIP code or neighborhood, an agent can pull the MLS numbers.
Can I compare inventory figures from different reports?
Not reliably. In August 2026, Maryland REALTORS showed Anne Arundel County’s active inventory below the year before, while Bright MLS’s Baltimore metro report showed it up 18.4%. Compare each publisher’s figure with its own year-ago number rather than mixing publishers in a year-over-year comparison.
Sources
- Maryland REALTORS, Housing Statistics, retrieved 2026-10-05, https://www.mdrealtor.org/HousingStats
- Maryland REALTORS, August 2026 Housing Statistics (current as of September 4, 2026), retrieved 2026-10-05, https://www.mdrealtor.org/Portals/22/adam/Page%20Elements/6PbyCYFmAUuCknSNNK36Ag/August/August%202026%20Housing%20Stats.pdf
- Bright MLS, August 2026 Housing Market Report (released September 10, 2026), retrieved 2026-10-05, https://www.brightmls.com/press-release/bright-mls-august-2026-housing-market-report
- Bright MLS, Baltimore Metro Housing Market Report, August 2026, retrieved 2026-10-05, https://image.m.brightmls.com/lib/fe2b11747364047b741278/m/1/c78e4997-e0bf-4d63-896e-09cb2d6419f1.pdf
- Bright MLS, Weekly Market Report, week ending October 4, 2026, retrieved 2026-10-05, https://image.m.brightmls.com/lib/fe2b11747364047b741278/m/1/92163607-cb80-49fc-8ab6-c04414b88f7a.pdf
- National Association of REALTORS, Existing-Home Sales, August 2026, retrieved 2026-10-05, https://www.nar.realtor/newsroom/nar-existing-home-sales-report-shows-2-0-decrease-in-august
- Freddie Mac, Primary Mortgage Market Survey, week of October 1, 2026, retrieved 2026-10-05, https://www.freddiemac.com/pmms
- U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Baltimore-Columbia-Towson Housing Market Profile (2023), retrieved 2026-10-05, https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/periodicals/USHMC/reg/BaltimoreColumbiaTowsonMD-HMP-23.pdf
- U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Baltimore-Columbia-Towson Comprehensive Housing Market Analysis (2023), retrieved 2026-10-05, https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/publications/pdf/BaltimoreColumbiaTowsonMD-CHMA-23.pdf
- Maryland Code, Real Property §14-104, retrieved 2026-10-05, https://mgaleg.maryland.gov/2026RS/Statute_Web/grp/14-104.pdf
Market figures cited here are the editions available on October 5, 2026; newer monthly releases may be out by the time you read this. This article is general information, not financial advice.
