The Nest Weekly — September 14, 2026

Week of September 14, 2026 | From Kaveh Sartipi, Nest Mortgage — Danville, CA

Bay Area Market Read

There is no single Bay Area housing market right now. There are two, and they are sitting inside the same headline number.

If you only read the regional median, you would think prices are ripping. If you only shop Contra Costa, you would think the market rolled over. Both readings are coming from the same week of data. That gap is the whole story this week.

The rate snapshot

Loan type	Week ending Sept 10	Prior week	One year ago
30-year fixed	6.76%	6.71%	6.35%
15-year fixed	6.09%	6.04%	5.50%

Rates as of September 14, 2026 — subject to qualification. Current rates posted at NestMortgage.ai/rates.

Source: Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey, national averages. These are survey averages, not quotes, and they are not what any individual borrower is offered. Your actual pricing depends on credit, equity, occupancy, property type, and loan structure.

The honest read: rates ticked up modestly for a second straight week and are running roughly four tenths of a point above where they sat a year ago. That is a nudge, not a regime change. Anyone waiting for a dramatic move in either direction has now been waiting for most of a year.

Current rates are published on NestMortgage.ai/rates and update regularly. Subject to qualification.

The market: two markets, one median

Here is the split that matters.

San Francisco has been running hot. Median sale prices there are up sharply year over year, and active inventory has actually fallen roughly 35% from a year ago — to around 570 listings — even though sellers brought about 10% more new listings to market. Homes are getting absorbed faster than they are being replaced. San Mateo has posted solid year-over-year gains as well. Santa Clara remains a high-velocity, seller-leaning environment.

Now the other eight counties. Price trends there look much more like the national picture: essentially flat versus a year ago. Contra Costa is carrying roughly 3,551 homes for sale with a median list price near $775,000 and a median 38 days on market. List prices there are down a little over 2% from last year.

So when someone tells you "the Bay Area is up 25%," they are describing a slice of the region, not the region. And when someone tells you "the market is soft," they are also describing a slice. Both are true. Neither is the whole thing.

The regional median is an average of two very different realities. Buy or sell based on your submarket, not the headline.

Inventory and leverage

Inventory is the tell. Where supply is thin — San Francisco, parts of the Peninsula — buyers are competing and sellers still set terms. Where supply has rebuilt, particularly San Mateo and Alameda in certain price bands and much of Contra Costa, buyers have real negotiating room: credits, repairs, rate-buydown contributions, longer timelines.

That last one deserves attention. A seller credit applied toward buying the rate down is often worth more to a buyer's monthly payment than the same dollars taken off the price. In a market where inventory has loosened, that credit is negotiable. In San Francisco right now, it mostly is not.

This is not a market where one strategy works everywhere. It is a market where the same buyer, with the same file, should behave differently depending on which county they are shopping.

What to do about it

For buyers: Get fully underwritten before you shop, not after you find the house. In the tight submarkets that is how you compete without waiving protections you should not waive. In the looser submarkets it is how you walk in and ask for a credit with credibility. And run the math on a buydown before you assume the sticker rate is your rate — the seller may be a willing participant in a way they were not two years ago.

For sellers: Price to your actual submarket, not to what your cousin in the city got. A Contra Costa listing priced off a San Francisco comp will sit, and a listing that sits loses negotiating power every week it ages past 38 days. If you are in a tight pocket, that is leverage worth using now while the supply picture favors you.

The closing thought: The counties are telling different stories this week. Which one applies to you depends entirely on where your zip code sits, and that is a conversation worth having before you make a move in either direction.

Questions about your specific situation, your specific zip code, or what you actually qualify for? Reply to this email or call me directly.

Kaveh Sartipi Mortgage Broker & Advisor, Nest Mortgage 925.718.0700 | Kaveh@MyNestMortgage.com NestMortgage.ai | 100 School Street, Danville, CA 94526

---

Kaveh Sartipi | NMLS# 247776 | DRE# 01363588 | Answer Home Loans, Inc. is a Licensed Real Estate Broker, California Department of Real Estate DRE# 02058505 | NMLS# 1729528 | Equal Housing Lender. This is not a commitment to lend. All loans subject to credit approval, underwriting, and program guidelines. Rates and terms subject to change without notice.