By Jonathan Bodeen · 17 August 2026
Since the summer of 2022, the price per square foot of a typical Phoenix home has barely moved. A home between 2,000 and 2,500 square feet is down about 1% in plain dollars. On paper, that is a steady market. On paper.
The Cromford Report ran those same prices a second way, adjusted for inflation, and it does not hold steady at all. Once you account for how much less a dollar buys in 2026 than it did in 2022, that same home is not down 1 percent. It is down about 13 to 14 percent in real value.
The difference between those two numbers is inflation. Your house can keep its sticker price and still lose ground, because the money it is priced in got weaker underneath it. Groceries, gas, insurance, all of it climbed. A home that stood still while the cost of living ran ahead did not really stand still.
This runs across most of the market. Homes under 2,000 square feet took the biggest real hit, down 16 to 17 percent. Move up in size and it eases. Homes from 2,000 to 2,500 square feet are off about 14 percent after inflation, and the 2,500 to 4,000 range is down closer to 9. Only the big houses, roughly 4,000 to 10,000 square feet, actually gained real value since the peak. Everything above and below them gave a little back.
It is not all grim though…
First, this is erosion, not a crash. Nobody is watching their equity collapse. Prices are steady in dollars. It is inflation doing the work, not foreclosures or panic selling.
Second, stretch the clock out and owners are still well ahead. Over the last ten years, even after inflation, most Phoenix homes gained real value, and plenty of it. The last three years handed a little of that back. After the wild 2020 and 2021 years, I suppose we should have expected a little correction.
This lands hardest on sellers who bought near the top in 2022 and expect to break even in real terms. In dollars you may be right where you started. Measured against what those dollars now buy, you may be a step behind.
Buyers may find good news here. Steady prices and a few years of raises means a paycheck that’s going further. A new home might be more within reach for you than it was in 2022.
None of this is a forecast. Inflation could cool, the dollar could firm back up, and the real numbers would follow it. But if you have been wondering why the market feels soft while prices look fine, that is the answer. The prices held. The dollars did not.
Give us a call anytime. We are happy to look at where your own home really stands, in both kinds of dollars.
Market data referenced in this article comes from The Cromford Report.