Kelowna Real Estate Market September 2026: Why Some Homes Sell While Others Sit
The Central Okanagan real estate market is not simply getting slower. Buyers are still purchasing homes, but a growing amount of older inventory is sitting. September is starting to separate homes buyers are willing to act on from properties that may need a different price, position, or strategy.
The rain over the last few days has made the Okanagan feel a lot more like fall.
The real estate market is starting to feel that way too.
This week I counted:
- 164 price reductions
- 82 cancelled listings
- 30 expired listings
My first thought was pretty simple.
Sellers are starting to give in.
But when I pulled apart what has happened so far in September, I found something more interesting.
The homes that are selling are not necessarily taking longer to sell.
The homes that are not selling are getting older.
A Lot of Central Okanagan Inventory Has Been Sitting for Months
Across roughly 2,600 active detached homes, townhomes and apartments in the Central Okanagan, the median listing had accumulated about 105 days of market exposure when I ran the numbers.
Nearly 7 out of 10 had been exposed to the market for at least 60 days.
More than half had been exposed for 90 days or longer.
That sounds like a very slow market.
But then look at the homes actually selling.
Homes that sold during the first half of September had a median current market time of about 51 days.
In August, it was around 55 days.
That is an important distinction.
The entire market is not simply getting slower at the same rate.
Instead, we appear to be building a larger pool of properties buyers have already had plenty of time to consider.
Some sell.
Others remain available month after month.
Buyers Have Not Disappeared
From September 1 to September 15, there were 129 detached, townhome and apartment sales in the Central Okanagan based on the categories I tracked.
During the first half of August, there were 136.
That is a decline of about 5%.
Historically, sales often fall more than that as we move from August into September.
We still have half of September to go, so I would not call this a trend yet.
But buyers have not disappeared.
They are still making decisions.
They just have enough choice that they do not have to overlook a property they believe is overpriced, poorly positioned, or simply not a strong fit.
That creates a very different market from one where almost everything sells because inventory is scarce.
Roughly One-Third of the "New Listings" I Counted Were Not Really New
This may be the most useful number I found.
From September 9 through September 15, 257 active listings came onto the market.
Roughly 95 of them had already been exposed to the market before.
That works out to about 37%.
So more than one out of every three listings hitting the market was not truly new inventory.
It was a property coming back for another try.
And when I looked specifically at the residential relists I could trace back to their previous listing, roughly three out of four returned at a lower price.
The typical reset was approximately 4.4%.
That tells me more than simply looking at the headline number of new listings.
Some sellers are not just reducing the price while keeping the same listing active.
They are cancelling, resetting the price and coming back to market hoping buyers look at the property differently.
The listing may look new online.
The property itself is not new to the market.
A Relist Does Not Erase the Market's Memory
This matters for sellers.
If a property spends 90 days on the market, cancelling it and putting it back up does not erase what happened during those first 90 days.
Buyers may have already seen it.
Their agents may already know the history.
The market may have already given the seller useful feedback.
A relist can still make sense.
A new price, new presentation or different strategy can create a reason for buyers to take another look.
But simply resetting the listing clock does not change the value of the property.
Something meaningful normally has to change with it.
4315 Ladd Court Shows How This Can Play Out
Take 4315 Ladd Court in Kelowna.
It originally came to market at $1,495,000.
The price was eventually adjusted to $1,429,000.
It sold September 3 for $1,370,000 after roughly 140 cumulative days of market exposure.
I cannot say the price reduction caused the sale.
We do not know exactly when the buyer became interested, when the offer was negotiated, or everything that happened behind the scenes.
But the property is a useful example of what can happen in a market like this.
The home sits.
Buyers respond, or do not respond.
The seller gets information from the market.
Eventually, the seller and buyer find a number they can both live with.
That is very different from assuming a home that has been sitting for 100 days simply cannot sell.
Central Okanagan Inventory Is Already Starting to Fall
Inventory itself has started shrinking.
Across detached homes, townhomes and apartments, I counted roughly 2,667 active listings at the end of August.
By September 16, that was closer to 2,593.
About 3% fewer listings in half a month.
That is not unusual for fall.
The more interesting question is what happens to those listings next.
Some sellers reduce their price.
Some cancel and relist.
Some hold.
Some take the property off the market and wait until spring.
At the same time, there are still buyers who want to purchase before winter.
That is why I think September starts separating the market.
If You Are Selling This Fall, Your Competition Matters More Than the Average
For a seller whose home has already been exposed to the market for 60, 90 or 120 days, I would stop focusing so much on whether the overall Kelowna market is up or down.
The more useful questions are:
What have buyers chosen instead of your home?
Which competing properties actually sold?
What did they offer that yours does not?
Was it price?
Condition?
Location?
Layout?
Lot?
Renovation level?
Or was there simply another home that represented better value?
Then ask another question.
Has anything changed since you originally listed?
Holding a price that buyers have already rejected for 90 days does not automatically become a stronger strategy because there are fewer fall listings.
But reducing the price just to say you reduced it is not the answer either.
The home still has to make sense compared with the alternatives buyers can purchase today.
Older Listings Can Be Interesting for Buyers Too
For buyers, I would pay close attention to older inventory.
But long market time is not the same thing as a deal.
Sometimes a home has been sitting because there is a legitimate problem.
Sometimes the price is still too high.
Sometimes the property needs work that buyers do not want to take on.
Sometimes the seller simply has no reason to negotiate.
But there is another possibility.
After months on the market, a seller may be ready to have a different conversation than they were when the home was first listed.
That is where the listing history becomes useful.
Has the price changed?
Has the property been cancelled before?
How many days has it actually been exposed to buyers?
What similar homes have sold?
How much competition is left?
Those questions tell you far more than simply seeing "12 days on market" on a freshly relisted property.
What I Am Watching Next
It is still early.
Half a month of September does not tell us what the entire fall market will look like.
I am watching a few things.
Do sales continue holding up as inventory declines?
Does the percentage of relisted properties stay high?
Do more sellers begin adjusting prices?
Do the homes actually selling begin taking longer too?
That last one matters.
If successful listings also start taking significantly longer to sell, then the story changes.
For now, September looks less like a market where everything is slowing equally and more like a market that is separating.
The better-positioned homes can still sell.
Buyers still have choices.
And sellers who have already spent months waiting are increasingly being forced to decide what they actually want to do.
The Question I Would Ask
For sellers, the question is not simply:
"Is the Kelowna market slow?"
It is:
"What are buyers doing with homes like mine?"
For buyers, it is not:
"Has this home been sitting long enough to get a deal?"
It is:
"Why has this home been sitting, and has anything changed?"
Those are much better questions.
And right now, the answers can look very different from one property to the next.
If there is a home you own or one you have been watching that has been sitting for a while, send me the address.
I can pull the listing history, competing properties and recent sales and tell you what I see.
Sometimes the listing is starting to get interesting.
Sometimes it still isn't.
Mark Coons Personal Real Estate Corporation
Mark Coons, BBA, CE
REALTOR® | eXp Realty Kelowna
Team Lead, Selling Okanagan Group
778-946-6454
[email protected]
