What are the best and slowest months to sell a Phoenix-area home?
May feels busy. January feels quiet. We tested both impressions against two complete years of ARMLS residential closed sales.
Why does the calendar change buyer behavior?
The local numbers
We added each calendar month’s sold residential listings in the ARMLS STAT reports for 2024 and 2025. These are marketwide MLS closings, not a city-only or single-family-only sample. The chart shows raw two-year totals rather than a promise about the sale price or marketing time for a particular house.
Three busiest closing months
- May 14,340
- April 13,732
- March 13,331
Three slowest closing months
- January 8,706
- November 10,308
- February 10,985
Why spring stands out in Phoenix
Pleasant weather makes touring, photography and moving easier before summer heat. Some families plan around the end of the school year, and seasonal residents may still be in town. Those are plausible contributors to the pattern, rather than causes proven by these counts. May’s lead appeared in the combined data even though April edged it in 2025 alone.
Does “May closings” mean “list in May”?
No. A closing commonly follows an accepted offer by several weeks, and the home may have been listed earlier still. A seller hoping to meet spring buyers could prepare and list before the peak closing months. For a particular property, compare new listings, pending contracts and closed sales in its price range and neighborhood to see the current pipeline.
What about the quieter months?
January’s low count is consistent with offers and closing schedules slowed by the preceding holiday season. November’s Thanksgiving interruptions can matter, while February’s shorter calendar compresses the raw total. Summer heat, travel and back-to-school planning may soften activity in July and August, but neither month landed in this dataset’s bottom three. The calendar is one influence; mortgage rates, inventory, pricing and property condition can overpower it.
Sources & method
Original data: ARMLS STAT archive, monthly Sold Listings current-month totals for January–December 2024 and January–December 2025. All 24 source values and individual PDF links. For example, May 2024, May 2025, January 2024 and January 2025. Counts are report-time snapshots and can change with MLS status corrections. Ranking uses unadjusted monthly counts, not day-adjusted activity, seller proceeds, median prices or time to contract. This analysis was available by July 1, 2026; later market data are intentionally excluded from this edition.
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