According to The Cromford Report's Cromford Market Index, built from data licensed through the Arizona Regional Multiple Listing Service (ARMLS), the Valley's 18 largest cities split into eight seller's markets, three balanced markets, and seven buyer's markets as of September 3. A month earlier, the count was eight seller's, four balanced, six buyer's. Almost nothing changed.

A friend and I were driving shelter dogs to Starbucks for pup cups the other week, and somewhere in Arcadia I noticed lawns that made no sense. We passed rows of suburban homes fronted by yards so lush they looked out of place in this parched metro. Each lawn sat under a few inches of standing water, held in by a low dirt berm. My knee-jerk reaction was, “What the–?” My friend, who's a native Phoenician, gave me that patient look they save for transplants tripping over what's supposed to be obvious. “It's flood irrigation, left over from when this was all citrus groves.”

Data centers are going up across the Phoenix metro, and some Valley homeowners have watched at least one rise near them without a clear sense of what it is. These buildings are gigantic, mostly windowless, and quiet, which tends to invite mystery. For example, Meta’s data center campus in Mesa is planned to span more than 2.5 million square feet (57 acres) across five buildings

Plenty of people write themselves off over their credit before they ever pick up the phone. Two Valley loan officers on how often that fear survives an honest conversation, and why the road back is often far shorter than you think.

Right now, some of the best deals in the valley are coming from builders, and there's a plain reason why. Unlike an individual seller, who can simply wait for a better market, builders have finished homes sitting empty, and every month one goes unsold costs them, so they compete for buyers in ways a single homeowner rarely will. For you, that most often means a lower monthly payment, which is the benefit almost every buyer feels first. What it solves beyond that depends on who you are and what's standing between you and the home you want.

When a deed, a lien, or a transfer gets filed with the county, nobody at the recorder's office is verifying that the person who signed it is really you. And that’s by design, not neglect. Recording offices exist to maintain the public record and to confirm completeness of the process, not to judge whether every signature is genuine. Which means the thing standing between you and someone filing a fraudulent document against your property is not a gatekeeper. It is whether you find out quickly.

Investment property buyers in Phoenix face a critical decision: should the property generate income through short-term rentals (Airbnb, VRBO, etc) or traditional long-term leasing? Both models sound reasonable on the surface. Both promise profitability. But the financial reality, operational burden, and risk profile are almost completely different. The choice depends less on which model is objectively better and more on what you can actually handle and what you're optimizing for.

SR 30 is a planned 29-mile east-west freeway designed to run south of and parallel to the maxed-out I-10, creating a relief corridor for the overcrowded interstate. Funded through Maricopa County's voter-approved Proposition 479 transportation sales tax extension, the  total project buildout is estimated at over $5 billion and is being constructed in three segments.

The Fed is powerful, and rate movements should follow Fed decisions. But if you're waiting for a Fed announcement to guide your home-buying timeline, it helps to understand what's actually driving mortgage rates. The story this year tells it better than any explanation.

The May numbers are in for Queen Creek, and if you own a home here — especially in the sub-$700,000 range — there are a few things worth paying attention to.

The easiest way to understand the East Valley market right now is this: prices are not collapsing, but buyers are not blindly chasing listings either. The market is holding up, but sellers still need to price carefully.

This report looks at homes priced up to $600,000 in Tempe, Mesa, Chandler, Gilbert and Queen Creek. In May, there were 713 closed sales, up almost 14% from last year, which tells us buyers are still active and homes are still selling. This is not a dead market, but it is a more selective one.

The Valley's stray pet situation is a real problem without a simple fix. But the community response to it — messy, decentralized, driven by neighbors who just didn't want to scroll past — is one of the more quietly remarkable things happening in Greater Phoenix. It's worth knowing about.

There's a lot to love about buying in the older sections of Tempe, Mesa, and Chandler. Established neighborhoods, mature lots, and proximity to jobs and amenities that newer fringe communities are still waiting on. Real value, especially compared to what the same dollar buys on the outer edges of the metro.

Many sellers spend $15,000 or more getting their home ready to list and recover less than 60 cents on every dollar. The difference isn't how much you spend, it's where. A garage door replacement delivers a 268% return. A full kitchen gut? Closer to 50%. Here's what the data actually says.

Most Phoenix homeowners know the obvious summer prep items: service the AC, keep the pool balanced, and adjust irrigation before the real heat settles in. Those still matter, but the easier-to-miss problems are often the ones that sneak up first.

A ceiling fan set the wrong direction. A door sweep leaking cool air. A blocked attic vent. A torn shade screen. A slow irrigation leak. A patio umbrella waiting for the first monsoon gust.

The appreciation many Phoenix homeowners saw over the last few years didn’t disappear just because the market feels slower. For many owners, that appreciation became equity, and that equity does a lot of heavy lifting. 

Buying a home right now can feel like reading tea leaves. Rates, headlines, inflation reports, and Fed announcements all seem to hint at what comes next, but mortgage rates do not move on guesses or hopes. For Phoenix-area buyers, the better move is to build a plan around real numbers, trusted lender guidance, and the parts of the deal you can actually control.

Phoenix is not one market. It’s dozens of small ones stitched together. And some of those are still very much in the seller’s column. The East Valley - Chandler, Mesa, and Gilbert- continues to show real strength. There’s consistent demand, steady employment centers, and buyers who specifically want those communities. When a home in the mid-price range is updated and priced correctly, it still moves. Sellers in these pockets are not giving away the house on concessions. 

You’re 27 or 30, sitting in a Phoenix apartment that just renewed at $1,900 a month. You scroll listings out of habit. A starter home shows estimated payments near $2,900. That gap feels reckless. That reaction has a name. It’s often called “payment shock”. The emotional reaction to a predictable rent number replaced by a much larger mortgage payment, and your brain says no. 

Short-term rentals are legal across Phoenix and most surrounding Valley cities, but the rules have changed in meaningful ways. What once felt like easy income now looks like running a small business. Valley cities now expect operators to register, license, collect taxes, and follow commercial rules.