This is the second of our monthly market updates, built from every residential sale closed through MLS of Southern Arizona in the twelve months to October 1. It is the first to cover all 20 areas we work, including Stone Canyon and Ventana Canyon, which we added in late September. Each area's full report, with its monthly series and price bands, is on our market pages.
The short version: prices held across the region, homes took two to three months from listing to closing, and the two new areas sit at opposite ends of the luxury market. Stone Canyon is now the highest-priced area we track by a wide margin, while Ventana Canyon's median is pulled down by its condominiums even though its price per square foot is among the highest in town.
One housekeeping note before the numbers. Several areas were redrawn along real boundaries on September 15, after our September update went out, so a change between that post and this one is mostly a change of map, not of market. The Catalina Foothills is the clearest case: $529,500 in September under the old ZIP-code definition, $660,000 today under the drawn boundary.
The areas at a glance
| Area | Median sold | $ per sq ft | Days to close | Closed sales | Sale-to-list | Cash buyers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stone Canyon | $2,150,000 | $522 | 76 | 29 | 95.9% | 86% |
| Tanque Verde | $710,000 | $282 | 62 | 269 | 98.2% | 41% |
| Catalina Foothills | $660,000 | $297 | 63 | 1,052 | 97.9% | 34% |
| Dove Mountain | $605,000 | $259 | 85 | 255 | 98.1% | 26% |
| Sam Hughes | $577,500 | $343 | 45 | 84 | 98.3% | 35% |
| Sabino Canyon | $510,000 | $247 | 55 | 65 | 98.4% | 38% |
| SaddleBrooke | $507,000 | $237 | 82 | 509 | 98.0% | 59% |
| Oro Valley | $500,000 | $254 | 72 | 1,010 | 98.2% | 38% |
| Downtown Tucson | $479,900 | $351 | 62 | 51 | 99.9% | 50% |
| Marana | $423,500 | $225 | 82 | 1,507 | 99.3% | 16% |
| Rincon Valley | $412,940 | $209 | 93 | 653 | 100.0% | 11% |
| Vail | $400,000 | $206 | 92 | 1,026 | 100.0% | 10% |
| Civano | $394,000 | $249 | 66 | 37 | 99.2% | 20% |
| Corona de Tucson | $375,450 | $188 | 85 | 246 | 100.0% | 11% |
| Midtown Tucson | $350,000 | $237 | 62 | 583 | 98.6% | 30% |
| Ventana Canyon | $349,000 | $314 | 68 | 91 | 97.3% | 50% |
| Sahuarita | $343,500 | $187 | 79 | 857 | 100.0% | 20% |
| Rita Ranch | $339,500 | $195 | 66 | 66 | 100.0% | 16% |
| Tucson Mountains | $329,000 | $208 | 69 | 745 | 98.7% | 25% |
| Green Valley | $300,000 | $201 | 72 | 1,167 | 98.3% | 49% |
Areas overlap where the MLS geography does: Dove Mountain sits inside Marana's ZIP codes and Sabino Canyon inside the Catalina Foothills', so the sales columns cannot be added across rows. Days to close run from the listing date to the closing date, so they include the escrow period, which was a median 28 to 35 days depending on the area.
What stood out
Stone Canyon, on 29 sales
Stone Canyon's median sale price was $2,150,000 at $522 per square foot, and 17 of its 29 sales closed at $2 million or more. It is also the most negotiated market we track: the median home sold for 95.9 percent of its final list price, the widest gap of any area, and took 76 days from listing to closing. Cash paid for 86 percent of those sales, and only 24 percent involved a seller concession, the lowest share in the region. Keep the sample in mind: 29 sales over a year is between one and six a month, so a single estate can move these figures. The Stone Canyon market report shows them month by month.
Ventana Canyon, two markets in one median
Ventana Canyon's $349,000 median would place it with Midtown, but its $314 per square foot is the fourth-highest in the region, behind only Stone Canyon, Downtown Tucson and Sam Hughes. The two numbers disagree because the area does: 54 of its 91 sales closed under $500,000, largely the condominiums and townhomes near Kolb and Sunrise, while 17 closed at $1 million or more. Half of its buyers paid cash, and the median sale closed at 97.3 percent of list, the second-widest gap after Stone Canyon. For any one Ventana Canyon home, the median says very little; the Ventana Canyon market report breaks sales down by price band.
Where homes sell fastest
Sam Hughes was again the quickest market, at a median 45 days from listing to closing, 28 of them in escrow, so a well-priced home there found its buyer in under three weeks. Sabino Canyon followed at 55 days. Rincon Valley was the slowest at 93 days, with Vail close behind at 92, both largely new-construction markets in the southeast. Most areas landed between 60 and 85 days.
Who is paying cash
After Stone Canyon, cash was most common in SaddleBrooke at 59 percent of sales, Downtown Tucson and Ventana Canyon at 50 percent, and Green Valley at 49 percent. In the Catalina Foothills, Oro Valley and Tanque Verde, between a third and two in five buyers paid cash. At the other end, only 10 percent of Vail sales and 11 percent in Rincon Valley and Corona de Tucson were cash: the first-home and new-construction markets remain financed markets.
The Catalina Foothills' monthly swing reversed
Last month the Catalina Foothills' monthly median jumped from $626,688 in July (102 sales) to $802,000 in August (70 sales). In September it came back to $639,000 on 59 sales, down 20.3 percent, the biggest month-over-month move of any area with at least 10 sales in both months. Neither move says what Foothills homes are worth: a monthly median in a market of 60 to 100 sales moves with whichever homes happened to close that month. The twelve-month median of $660,000 is the steadier number, and it is the one we would quote.
How close to asking sellers got
In Vail, Rincon Valley, Corona de Tucson and Rita Ranch, the median sale closed at exactly 100 percent of its final list price, so half of those homes sold at or above asking, and Sahuarita was a hair behind. The luxury end negotiated hardest: Stone Canyon at 95.9 percent, Ventana Canyon at 97.3 percent and the Catalina Foothills at 97.9 percent. The ratio is measured against the final list price after any reductions, not the original asking price.
Seller concessions in the southeast
The markets that sell closest to asking are also the ones where sellers most often pay toward the buyer's costs. Concessions were recorded on 77 percent of Vail sales and 76 percent in Rincon Valley, with a median of $8,651 in both where one was given, and on 75 percent in Corona de Tucson. Stone Canyon (24 percent) and SaddleBrooke (25 percent) had the lowest shares. A concession lowers the seller's net the same way a price cut does, so a 100 percent sale-to-list ratio with a $8,651 credit is not quite what it looks like.
What it means if you are buying or selling now
If you are selling at the top of the market, in Stone Canyon, Ventana Canyon or the Catalina Foothills, expect to negotiate: the median sale there closed two to four percent under its final list price, and most of your buyers will be paying cash and in no hurry. In Vail, Rincon Valley, Corona de Tucson or Sahuarita you can expect close to full price, but budget for a concession of around $8,000 to $9,000, because two-thirds to three-quarters of sellers there gave one.
If you are buying with a loan in SaddleBrooke, Ventana Canyon, Downtown or Green Valley, half or nearly half of your competition pays cash, so a fully underwritten pre-approval and a short inspection period carry real weight. In the southeast, asking for closing-cost help is the norm, not a long shot.
We refresh these figures on the first of every month. If you want to know what they mean for one particular address, ask us for a home valuation; it is free and it is specific.
