Home prices across the Coachella Valley kept drifting lower in October, with the median detached home selling for $610,000, down 2.9% from a year earlier, while attached homes fetched a median of $410,000, a 2.4% dip. Sales activity slowed too, continuing a pattern that has defined the valley's housing market for much of the year.
The median price figures come from a monthly housing report published by kevinstanley.net, which tracks sales across the Greater Palm Springs area. The same report found the three-month average of valley sales fell to 471 units a month in October, down from 547 units a year earlier — a decline that mirrors broader cooling trends reported throughout the fall.
Dollar volume told a similar story. Average monthly dollar sales across the valley totaled $367 million in October, compared with $437 million the previous year, according to the report. Total valley inventory held almost steady, ending October at 3,213 units, just 0.1% below the prior year's count.
Palm Desert Tops City-Level Sales
Among individual cities, Palm Desert posted the most sales in October with 96 units, ahead of Palm Springs with 88 and Indio with 80, per the same source. The rankings offer a snapshot of where buyer activity concentrated even as the valley overall saw fewer transactions than the year before.
The slowdown isn't new. As The Desert Sun has reported, the Coachella Valley's September housing market was already sluggish compared with the year before. That weakness showed up across several measures: the valley recorded 411 closed sales in September 2026, down 12.2% from September 2025's 468, according to a market report from dsgrealtors.com. That same report put the valley's median sold price at $580,000 in September, exactly flat year-over-year, while active inventory rose to 2,835 listings with 982 new listings entering the market.
Palm Springs Sales Pace Lags Prior Year
Palm Springs itself has been a focal point of the slowdown. The city averaged 97 sales a month over the three months ending in September, down from 117 a year earlier, the Coachella Valley sales trend noted. At the end of September, the valley's median detached home price stood at $624,000, down a modest 0.3% from a year before, while a typical 2,175-square-foot detached Palm Springs home was estimated at $1,102,246, a 1.4% decline from $1,118,046 the prior year. A typical 1,250-square-foot attached home in the city was priced at $425,614, down 0.7% from $428,463.
Buyers also appear to be gaining some leverage. The median time on market for Palm Springs homes was 55 days in September, compared with 61 days a year earlier, according to a report from pstribune.com. That same report found Palm Springs homes sold for an average of roughly 4.3% below their final listing price.
Indio's September Numbers Diverge Between Sources
Indio stood out in September as the rare bright spot for sales growth, though sources differ on the exact count. The dsgrealtors.com market report put Indio at 90 sales in September, up 32.4% year-over-year, and described it as the only city in its report with positive year-over-year sales growth. A separate statistics page from desertluxuryproperties.com put the figure at 84 total sales in September, up 27% compared with September 2025. The two counts don't match, and the available reporting doesn't explain why.
The desertluxuryproperties.com page also reported an Indio median sale price of $553,500 in September, described as slightly higher than a year earlier. By contrast, the same source found Palm Springs single-family home sales fell sharply, with 38 total homes sold, down 36% from September 2025, and a median sales price of $794,500, down 16% from the prior year.
A Broader Pattern Across Valley Cities
Detached single-family home sales were down, often significantly, in six of the valley's nine cities compared with a year earlier, The Desert Sun reported, with Indio standing out as the only city to see a significant increase. Palm Desert and Coachella saw only modest increases by comparison, underscoring just how uneven the recovery has been from one community to the next even as the valley overall continues to cool.
