87 of 88 Ohio counties are still clocking record or near-record home prices. Jackson County is the only county with home values lower than last year, according to Zillow's newest data, which I broke down on my latest live stream.
That number alone tells you nothing's wrong. But look past price and something's building underneath it. Higher interest rates. Higher property taxes. Higher cost of living. Higher everything. Homes are sitting on the market longer than they have in years. All of it is keeping homebuyers on the sidelines right now.
I'm watching the erosion of buyer demand even as home prices keep climbing. The question is whether prices roll over in the coming months if that demand keeps falling.
Ohio's typical home value has grown from $132,136 to $253,182 over the last 10 years — a 91.6% increase. But the growth is decelerating: year-over-year price growth peaked at 17.84% in mid-2021 and has since slowed to 3.58%, a range much closer to historical norms.
Prices are higher than they were last year. And the year before that. Over the last 10 years, Ohio home prices have grown over 90% — from $132,136 to $253,182.
To be sure, Ohio home price growth is through the roof over the last 10 years. But look closer and it's anchored to two years. 2020 through 2022 saw prices explode 29.3% in 24 months. Absolutely crazy.
Here's what I'm seeing now: price growth is decelerating. In other words, home prices are going up slower than they were over the last few years. It's not negative — home prices aren't dropping — but they're not climbing 10% a year anymore. The latest data shows home prices are up 3.58% year over year, which is actually closer to a normal range.
Break it down by county and 87 of Ohio's 88 counties are up year over year. Only one is down — Jackson County, off 1.48%.
Here's where Ohio home prices are growing the most year over year:
| County | Typical Home Value | YoY Price Growth |
|---|---|---|
| Putnam | $261,968 | +9.01% |
| Darke | $221,197 | +8.94% |
| Carroll | $215,164 | +8.67% |
| Gallia | $175,650 | +7.91% |
| Monroe | $155,500 | +7.64% |
| Shelby | $250,274 | +7.56% |
| Trumbull | $172,462 | +7.35% |
| Paulding | $165,220 | +7.27% |
| Champaign | $260,717 | +7.23% |
| Preble | $239,126 | +7.07% |
Now look at Ohio's biggest, most expensive counties — this is where growth has slowed the most:
| County | Typical Home Value | YoY Price Growth |
|---|---|---|
| Franklin | $326,432 | +0.39% |
| Delaware | $541,657 | +0.72% |
| Hamilton | $278,895 | +1.14% |
| Warren | $423,176 | +1.46% |
| Union | $421,478 | +2.11% |
The bottom line: home prices are growing slower in the expensive areas and still accelerating faster in the rural, cheaper markets. A 7-8% jump on a $200,000 home doesn't add up to the same dollars as a 2% jump on a $500,000 home — but the rate tells you where the momentum actually is.
Is price going up where you live? Use my Ohio data page to find out.
Price alone doesn't explain what's happening. For that, I had to go to the demand side — and realtor.com's data shows exactly why growth is slowing down.
To really understand what's driving these dynamics, you have to look at supply and demand. How many homes are on the market. How many buyers are chasing them.
Realtor.com tracks this with something called the pending ratio. You can find it for your own county or ZIP code on my Ohio housing data page.
The pending ratio is simple: it's the number of pending sales for every one active listing on the market. The higher the number, the more demand. The lower the number, the less demand.
As of August 2026, Ohio's statewide pending ratio is 0.70. That means there are 0.7 buyers under contract for every one home sitting on the market — less than one buyer per listing.
To give you perspective: Ohio peaked at 2.06 in May 2021. Two buyers for every listing. Now it's dropped to 0.70.
In May 2021, the average 30-year mortgage rate was under 3%. Today it's 6.95%.
That 2.06-to-0.70 collapse isn't random — it's the pandemic boom unwinding. Markets overheated in 2021 during the pandemic housing boom. Low interest rates and boredom, combined with FOMO, created a buying frenzy. Homebuyers were willing to do anything to beat the competition.
Thank goodness those days are gone. But now I'm dealing with the fallout. As mortgage rates climbed from under 3% to nearly 7% today, the FOMO drained out of the market — and you can see it play out in home prices, which accelerated rapidly from 2020 to 2022 and have decelerated ever since.
Now that rates are higher, there's more inventory. Demand is lower. Pending ratio is falling fast. And price growth has decelerated. The data proves it:
| County | Pending Ratio (2021) | Price Growth (2020–22 Run-Up) | Pending Ratio (2026) | Price Growth (2026) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Butler | 3.79 | +32.3% | 0.79 | +3.4% |
| Montgomery | 3.08 | +30.5% | 0.68 | +3.5% |
| Summit | 2.32 | +26.0% | 0.80 | +4.1% |
| Stark | 2.07 | +24.0% | 0.84 | +4.4% |
Pending ratio is the May 2021 peak. "Price Growth (2021)" is the Aug 2020–Aug 2022 window — the full run-up, not a single calendar year. "Price Growth (2026)" is the latest year-over-year figure, Aug 2025–Aug 2026.
Four counties. Every one saw pending ratios above 2 — Butler above 3 — at the peak of the pandemic frenzy. Every one is now below 1.
Look at Butler County. In 2021, there were nearly 4 buyers for every listing, and prices ran up 32% in two years. Now the pending ratio has collapsed to 0.79, and price growth has slowed to 3.4% — a tenth of where it was.
Summit County tells the same story with less extremity. Pending ratio dropped from 2.32 to 0.80. Price growth went from 26% over two years to 4.1% in the last twelve months.
Montgomery and Stark move in lockstep with the other two. Pending ratios cut by more than half. Price growth down to low single digits. This isn't one county cooling off. It's the pattern, county after county.
Pending ratio and price growth don't move together. One leads. The other follows.
| Year | Pending Ratio (Aug) | YoY Price Growth |
|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 1.47 | +6.57% |
| 2021 | 1.43 | +17.13% |
| 2022 | 1.13 | +10.39% |
| 2023 | 1.10 | +3.43% |
| 2024 | 0.90 | +5.85% |
| 2025 | 0.79 | +3.56% |
| 2026 | 0.70 | +3.58% |
Pending ratio peaked in 2020. Price growth didn't peak until 2021 — a full year later. Demand turned first. Price followed with a lag.
Then pending ratio kept falling every year after that. Price growth followed the same path, but slower. It took until 2023 before growth cooled off in a meaningful way, and it's been grinding lower ever since.
That's the pattern. Demand shifts. Price catches up months, sometimes a year or more, later.
Pending ratio is still falling right now. If the pattern holds, price growth has more room to decelerate before it stabilizes — not because prices are about to crash, but because the number that leads price is still pointing down.
Falling demand isn't just about rates and prices. It's about everything else buyers are paying for at the same time.
Property taxes keep climbing. The average Ohio county's median property tax bill jumped from $1,813 in 2020 to $2,231 in 2024 — up 23% in four years.
Mortgage rates aren't helping either. A year ago, the average 30-year rate was 6.26%. Today it's 6.95%.
And insurance has already taken its bite — Ohio homeowners insurance rates climbed 36.4% between 2019 and 2024, one of the steepest run-ups in the country, driven by record tornado activity and rising rebuild costs.
On top of all that, inflation and the overall economy are still sticky and running hot. That's pushing up the cost to maintain a house and cover daily expenses — which eats directly into what's left over to actually buy a home.
Stack it together and the total cost to own and hold a home in Ohio is up substantially over the last several years — even before you factor in the mortgage itself. That's what's pushing buyers to the sidelines. It's not that they don't want to buy. It's that the math doesn't work like it used to.
Right now is, in a lot of ways, the worst time to buy a house in Ohio. Prices are still near record highs, rates are still near 7%, and the cost of everything else has gone up too.
But for the savvy buyer, it might actually be one of the better times. Here's why: it's always good to buy when there's less competition, not more. And right now there's less competition for buying a house than there's been in years.
Sellers are feeling that too. They're getting fewer showings. Less interest. Fewer offers. Some of them actually need to sell — a job relocation, a divorce, an estate — and they're willing to cut the price more than they have in the last few years to make that happen.
That doesn't mean you're walking away with a house for pennies on the dollar. It does mean a seller might accept an offer today that they wouldn't have touched two years ago.
If you're selling: price it right the first time. Homes aren't moving in a weekend like 2021. They're sitting for weeks — 43 days on average statewide, and 22.39% of listings have already taken a price cut. Overprice it and you'll end up as one of those statistics instead of ahead of them.
Bottom line: demand is cooling. Prices haven't cracked. But the warning signs are real, and they're not going away on their own.
Heading into winter, homebuyer demand always slows. That's seasonal, nothing new. What's different this year is the supply side — sellers who genuinely need to sell aren't waiting for spring. If listing activity holds up while buyer demand stays suppressed, this winter could be one of the best times to buy in Ohio in years.
No sign of it yet. 87 of 88 counties are still up year over year. What's happening is deceleration, not decline — growth is slowing from double digits to mid-single digits, not turning negative.
It's the number of pending home sales for every one active listing on the market. A ratio above 1 means more buyers than listings. Below 1 means more listings than buyers. Ohio's is 0.70 right now.
Prices are still high and rates are still near 7%, so it's not an easy market. But competition is lower than it's been in years, and sellers are more willing to negotiate — which makes it a good time for a patient, prepared buyer specifically.
Price is a lagging number. It reacts to demand shifts months, sometimes over a year, later. Demand has been falling since 2021 — prices are only now starting to feel it.
Mostly small, rural counties — Putnam (+9.01%), Darke (+8.94%), and Carroll (+8.67%) lead the state. Ohio's biggest, priciest counties are growing far slower.
Unlikely to turn negative on their own, but if the warning signs in this post turn into real, systemic problems, this winter is when Ohio could see its first real price declines.
Statewide numbers only tell you so much. Use my Ohio housing data page to look up your own county or ZIP code, or tune into my weekly live stream every Friday at noon and ask your question directly. You can also contact me if you want to talk through your specific situation.
Jasson Farrier is a licensed REALTOR® and investor covering the Ohio housing market on Ohio Housing Nerd and the national market on Housing Nerd. All data pulled from primary sources and updated monthly — see the full methodology.
Buying or selling in Ohio? Let's talk.