Homes Are Taking Longer to Sell Than They Did Last Year

A year ago, homes across this stretch of the Charleston area were moving fast. Median days on market across the territory sat at 63.5 days. That was the pace buyers and sellers had come to expect.

That pace is gone. Over the twelve weeks ending August 30, 2026, median days on market across the territory rose to 76 days.

It's not a small shift. It's nearly two extra weeks of waiting, on average, before a home gets under contract.

The two markets inside this territory aren't behaving identically, either. In Charleston, median days on market rose to 82.5 days this window, up from 62.5 days the same window a year earlier. That's a real stretch in patience required from sellers there.

Mount Pleasant tells a milder version of the same story. In Mount Pleasant, median days on market ran 70 days this window.

The two markets also diverge on how quickly buyers enter contract in the first place. In Charleston, median days to pending ran 73 days. In Mount Pleasant, median days to pending ran 52 days. That's one territory, two very different clocks running underneath it.

None of this means buyers left. Homes sold across the territory numbered 419 this period, up from 408 a year ago. People are still buying. They're just not racing to do it.

What did move for sellers: the territory's median sold price landed at $915,000, and the territory's median sale-to-list percentage came in at 98.5%. In Mount Pleasant, sale-to-list fell to 98.1% this window, down from 98.6% the same window a year earlier, a modest give-back at the negotiating table.

For someone selling in Charleston, the practical read is this: price for the market that exists today, not the one from last summer. A home that would have gone under contract in a matter of days last year may now sit through a couple of showings' worth of Saturdays before it does. That's not a red flag. It's the new baseline.

For someone selling in Mount Pleasant, the same lesson applies, though the stretch has been milder so far.

For buyers, the extra time is leverage. There's more room to think, more room to negotiate, and less pressure to waive a contingency just to beat somebody else to the table.

What to watch next: whether Charleston's slower pace to pending narrows back toward Mount Pleasant's, or whether the gap between the two markets keeps widening. That's the number that will say whether this territory is settling into a single new rhythm, or splitting into two genuinely different markets.

This report draws on MLS sold data for the twelve weeks ending August 30, 2026.

Chris