January 2024 · Market · 3 min read · by Kinan Sawar, MD — REALTOR® at Shorewest, REALTORS®
After a year of rate shock, 2024 looks like more of the same: elevated mortgages, thin inventory, and a market stuck in low gear.
The hope entering 2024 was for relief. The base case is patience.
Mortgage rates that doubled in 2022 stayed high through 2023, and there’s little sign of a quick return to the 3% era. “Higher for longer” is the phrase, and housing has to live with it.
Expect another year of historically low transaction volume: would-be sellers locked into cheap mortgages, would-be buyers priced out, and prices drifting sideways with sharp regional differences underneath.
The action in 2024 is local. Markets that build and gained the most pandemic migration are the ones to watch for softening; affordable, supply-tight markets should hold. The national number will be boring; the map won’t.
Kinan Sawar, MD — REALTOR® at Shorewest, REALTORS®, serving Milwaukee and Southeast Wisconsin (Milwaukee, Waukesha, Ozaukee, Washington, Racine, Kenosha, and Walworth counties). Email: [email protected] · Phone: (618) 713-2964.
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Home values and rents are Zillow ZHVI/ZORI estimates for the named area, as of 2026-07-03; incomes and population are U.S. Census (SAIPE, Population Estimates); migration is IRS Statistics of Income. Area-level statistical estimates for information only — not an appraisal, and not financial, legal, or tax advice.