Boston has the fewest home listings nationally, in a market steeped with competition driven by low inventory.

A new report from Zillow found Boston is the No. 1 market for year-over-year declines in housing supply. Boston listings are down 17.2% from 2023, followed by Pittsburgh, which was down 14.2%, and Washington, D.C., which was down 13.6%, according to Zillow’s March Housing Market Report. 

Nationally in March, new listings rose 15.5% from February and were up 3.7% from 2023. 

New listings were down 25.4% from pre-pandemic levels

Zillow’s report found that depending on their locations, homebuyers are encountering very different scenarios when it comes to competition in the current market – all driven by the same factor: inventory.

And that’s not all.

Typical U.S. home values are up 42.4% compared to pre-pandemic levels, as is the typical monthly mortgage payment, which is up nearly 108%, more than double pre-pandemic payments. Annually, the typical mortgage payment is up 7.1% from last year.

Boston had one of the highest annual home-price gains in March.

Zillow found home values were up from last year in 47 of the 50 largest metros. Annual price gains were highest in Hartford, Connecticut (12.7%), San Diego (11.8%), San Jose, California (11.2%), Boston (9.5%) and Los Angeles (9.3%).