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RE: REAL ESTATE PODCAST
Episode 83 — Show Notes
Houma-Thibodaux April 2026 Market Update: Pending Sales Up 28% | RE: Real Estate Podcast
Content Type
Discussion
Primary Goal
Give Houma-Thibodaux buyers and sellers a clear, data-backed read on the April 2026 market and what it means for their next move.
Keywords
Houma real estate, Thibodaux real estate, South Louisiana real estate, April 2026 housing market, Bayou Board of REALTORS, Terrebonne Parish housing, Lafourche Parish housing, months supply of inventory, median sales price, housing affordability index, VA loan Louisiana, FHA loan, USDA loan, pending sales, buyer’s market, seller’s market, balanced market, pre-approval, RPR market trends, Bayou region real estate, Houma-Thibodaux market update
Summary
April 2026 looks like a turning point for the Bayou region housing market. Pending sales across the entire Bayou Board of REALTORS® area jumped almost 28% in a single month, year-to-date pending sales are up 21.5%, and homes are selling faster than they were a year ago. But the headline median sales price tells only half the story.
Clint Galliano and Ben Harang dig into the Bayou Board Local Market Update and the RPR Market Trends Reports for Houma, Thibodaux, Terrebonne Parish, and Lafourche Parish to show why one regional headline can hide four completely different markets. Thibodaux is firmly a seller’s market with just 4.02 months of supply. Lafourche Parish has moved into balanced territory. Houma is balanced as well. Terrebonne Parish is the one buyer’s market in the group. They also break down why softer board-wide median prices do not mean home values are dropping, how interest rates near 6% are shaping the price brackets that actually sell, and why national headlines on rates rarely match what local FHA, USDA, and VA buyers are getting.
The episode closes with practical guidance for both sides of the transaction and homework for listeners to size up their specific market.
Key Topics
• Why pending sales surged almost 28% in April across the Bayou Board area
• Months supply of inventory drops from 7.9 to 6.2, the healthiest board-wide reading in over a year
• Why median sales price is down 5.4% while RPR estimated home values stay flat to up
• The four-market breakdown: Thibodaux, Lafourche Parish, Houma, Terrebonne Parish
• How interest rates near 6% are shifting which price points actually sell
• Why national interest-rate headlines do not match local FHA, USDA, and VA rates
• Housing Affordability Index up 11.2% and what it means for first-time and VA buyers
• Pricing strategy for sellers in a market where well-priced homes attract multiple offers
• Pre-approval as table stakes for buyers competing for limited inventory
Hosts
Clint Galliano, REALTOR®, Keller Williams Realty Bayou Partners
Ben Harang, REALTOR®, Keller Williams Realty Bayou Partners
Titles
Houma-Thibodaux April 2026 Market Update: Pending Sales Up 28% | RE: Real Estate Podcast
Sound Bites
Clint: “If you only read one headline about our market this spring, you would probably think prices are falling and buyers are backing off. The April numbers tell a different and very interesting story.”
Ben: “6% is a balanced market, 7% is a buyer’s market. So if you’re in the market as a buyer, the time to get in is now.”
Ben: “The $600,000 house may still be worth $600,000. But what we’re selling more of is bracketed down to get that monthly payment in a range where the buyers are comfortable.”
Clint: “How’s the market? That’s the wrong question. It depends on where you are.”
Clint: “Demand is strong, supply is tight, and the smart move depends on where you are.”
Chapters
00:00 Hook
00:53 Welcome
01:33 Episode overview and data sources
02:54 Bayou Board snapshot: pending sales surge, supply tightens
06:01 Prices look soft, but RPR values are holding
10:23 Four markets, three personalities
15:26 Faster sales and improving affordability
18:15 Why national interest-rate headlines do not match local rates
19:53 Takeaways for sellers and buyers
22:10 Homework
24:57 Close and how to reach out
Resources
• Bayou Board of REALTORS® Local Market Update, April 2026. View report
• Houma RPR Market Trends Report, April 2026. View report
• Thibodaux RPR Market Trends Report, April 2026. View report
• Terrebonne Parish RPR Market Trends Report, April 2026. View report
• Lafourche Parish RPR Market Trends Report, April 2026. View report
Show Links
Website: rerealestatepodcast.com
Ask a question: rerealestatepodcast.com (click the “Ask a Question” button)
Listen and subscribe to the RE: Real Estate Podcast wherever you get your podcasts.
Click here to watch a video of this episode.
Click here to watch a video of this episode.
Creators and Guests
Host
Ben Harang
Ben Harang brings over 30 years of experience as a licensed agent and currently works with Keller Williams Realty Bayou Partners. Ben’s experience includes single family residential sales, large land sales, subdivision development, building new construction residential and commercial projects and selling REO/Foreclosed properties.
What is RE: Real Estate Podcast?
Ben Harang and Clint Galliano discuss buying & selling Louisiana real estate in black & white.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (00:00)
If you only read one headline about our market this spring, you would probably think prices are falling and buyers are backing off. The April numbers tell a different and very interesting story. Across the entire Bayou Board area, pending sales jumped almost 28 % in a single month, and homes are selling faster than they were a year ago. So today we're cutting through the noise. We're walking through the April 2026 numbers for Houma, Thibodaux
Terrebonne and Lafourche Parishes and showing you why one regional headline can hide four completely different markets. Let's talk about
Ben Harang (00:53)
Hello, everybody, and welcome to another episode of the real estate podcast. I'm Ben Harang with my co-host Clint Galliano. We're just two guys in South Louisiana talking real estate in black and white. How's it going today, Clint?
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (01:12)
Hey man, things are going wonderful, Ben. It's terrific. How you doing?
Ben Harang (01:16)
I'm doing terrific, Clint. We spent the day yesterday cooking lunch for some special people. We took some time off and did that kind of recharge and refocus. So here we are today. What we're talking about today, Clint.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (01:33)
we're back in the middle of the month. So we've got the numbers for April and 2026. So we're be going over sales and listings and all that fun stuff. And there's a lot to unpack.
we're gonna jump right into it. A quick note, we're referencing, I think it's five different reports, and we're gonna have links to all those reports in the show notes. So we're drawing on two main data sources. One is the local market update that we get from Louisiana Realtors every month, which is the total Bayou Board of Realtors market.
And it gives us statistics on that. So it's all residential properties that are townhouses, apartments, and single-family dwellings. The second is a set of RPR, or Realtors Property Resource Market Trend Reports. And we've got one each for Houma, Thibodaux, Terrebonne Parish, and Lafourche Parish. Through line.
Pretty much for the whole episode is that April is a demand-driven market with tightening supply. Prices are looking a little soft on surface, and each of the sub-markets, be it city or parish, are all behaving differently.
Ben Harang (02:54)
All right, we'll start off with the demand is surging while supply tightens. All the figures in this segment are from the buy board of realtors numbers for April of 2026, covering all residential property across the board's footprint. Pending sales are 179 in April, which is up almost 28 % from April of 2025. And year to date, it's up 21.5 % from
511 to 620 units this month. Close.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (03:27)
So Ben, what you think
is driving the pending sales up?
Ben Harang (03:31)
Glad you asked that Clint. It's the pent up demand. Life happens, interest rates had been had been high or higher than the market liked them. And they dipped a little bit and people got excited. And I think they're still excited about it. They haven't. A lot of people have been on the sidelines for the last three years, I guess, three, maybe four years since we had 3 % money.
It's 6 % plus or minus right now, depending on which loan product there is. But that's still historically competitive rate. And I think people have realized that that's what the rate is. And you have new people getting married, having children, moving up, moving down. As life happens, they need to live somewhere. So I think it's just continuing, because the interest rate's at a competitive level.
Life goes on and that's what drives, generally drives the real estate market.
all right. Well, where are we now? Inventory of homes for sale is 829, which is down almost 8%. So the pool of homes to buy from is actually shrinking. And then the month supply of inventory, if you've seen this podcast at all, you understand that the months of inventory is how many months it would take us
to sell the current inventory if nothing else was listed for sale. And board-wide, we're at 6.2%. And it's been a long time since we've, I don't think we've been at board-wide since we started this podcast about a year and a half ago, saw the entire buyer board at 6.2%. We've seen segments of it, but not the entire board. So the market is definitely healthier than it has been.
It's down 21.5 % from a year ago, which was at 7.9%. 6 % is a balanced market, 7 % is a buyer's market. So if you're in the market as a buyer, the time to get in is now. If you're in the market as a seller, the price is a holding firm. In April, we had 201 new listings, which is down 7.4%.
year to date is down 3.6%. So we have fewer houses to sell and it feels like we have a buyer pool coming back into the market.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (06:01)
It's an interesting thing. the other things that we're looking at is pricing. So prices looks soft, but values are holding.
So with the surface number and the real story, those numbers diverge.
So for the Bayou Board median sales price, it was almost 194,000 in April, and that's down 5.4%. The year to date median sales price was $200,000, and that's down 4.8. Now the average sales price was 209, almost 210,000, and that's down 13.6.
That steep drop signals a mix of what's sold shifting towards the lower price points. And we talked about that last month, that it seems like, and especially in the tighter inventory sub-markets, the lower price points are what seems to be moving. And again, all of these numbers are from the overall Bayou Board not necessarily the sub-market numbers, but...
those sub markets do make up a good bit of what's moving. And then the list to sold ratio is 96.6. And that's holding essentially flat. So what that's also saying is that the homes that are priced accurately, that they're getting close to full asking and moving. Now, by contrast,
Ben Harang (07:34)
Mm-hmm.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (07:36)
The RPR numbers across the board, the median estimated property value, which models what homes are worth rather than just what it's sold for, is flat over the past 12 months in every individual market, relatively flat. Just under 2 % for Houma. Lafourche Parish is up a little bit over a percent. Thibodaux's up a little over a percent. And Terrebonne Parish is just under 1 % off.
So it's kind of interesting. The estimated value is holding the same. I think what's winding up happening, and we said this a minute ago, is that the homes that are being priced accurately or put on the market at an accurate price are the ones that are moving. Anything else is sitting.
Ben Harang (08:31)
And I don't think individual
prices on housing went down. What was it? 13 % in a year. I think the market and what's being sold has bracketed down. So the bracket down, that's a reflection of the interest rate. The note is based on principle and interest. So the values went down. That $600,000 house may still be worth $600,000. But what we're selling more of is bracketed down to get that
monthly payment in a range where the buyers are comfortable.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (09:04)
And that's the key thing to remember. These are sales price other than the RPR estimated values. Sales price means what's sold. And what seems to be a trend is that the lower price of the market are the ones that moving, which is kind of been a thesis of mine.
is that higher price homes is just going to take longer to sell. And the lower the price range is going to be a lot more affordable for the majority of the buyer population.
Ben Harang (09:42)
Right, with the lower interest rate, the dollar value of the houses went up. With higher interest rates, the dollar value of the houses are going down to get the note where people are comfortable. That's my takeaway of what's going on. We say it's going down and we have more people buying. We say it's going down and the prices are up and it's all over the board. But I think it's a true reflection of the interest rate. All right.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (10:07)
Yeah, mean,
interest rate impacts probably 85 to 95 % of the sales that happen in our market.
Ben Harang (10:18)
Yeah, and you throw in a little bit insurance and then it just gets wild.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (10:22)
Hahaha.
Ben Harang (10:23)
we have four markets we're talking about and they have three personalities. The centerpiece of the episode is one region of Bayou Board of Realtors, but the RPR data shows three distinct market types. And it sounds like a broken record if you've heard this before. Thibodaux is a seller's market with only four months of inventory, which is...
really low. Sold to list is 99.7 percent which means as soon as it gets on the market people are buying it if it's it's priced right and the median sold price is about 224,500 dollars. Lafourche Parish as a whole is a balanced market at 5.56 months of supply and the sold to list is 98.6
... I'm pleased with this in Lafourche Parish because Lafourche Parish as a whole has been in a buyer's market up until median sold price is $221,900 for Lafourche Parish and then we get into Houma It's a balanced market at 6.18 months of inventory. It's just over 6 % so it's a
It's a balanced market, which is always healthy. The sold to list is 97.2 % and the median sold price is $180,000. Again, like we were saying, it's not all of the home values are not coming down. What we're actually selling are just some lower priced houses. And then for Terrebonne Parish as ⁓ a whole,
It's at 6.58%, which is very close to a balanced market, as close as we've seen Terrebonne Parish to a balanced market since Hurricane Ida and the free money. The 96.1 % is the sold to list price throughout Terrebonne Parish, and the median sold price is $185,500.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (12:22)
for sure.
Ben Harang (12:36)
The story in each individual RPR market for April 26, Thibodaux is the tightest market in the region. And that's kind of been a consistent theme since the market started coming back with just four months of inventory and sellers receiving 99.7 % of the list price, which is crazy in my mind. But if they're priced right, you're going to sell your house. Lafourche Parish is
balanced and notably healthy with the 98.6 % of the sold to list and the median sold price up 10 % month over month and the days on the market the fastest in the region at 62 days. Houma is balanced sitting right at six months of supply. Its median price dipped to 180 while RPR's median estimated value held
at $225,000. And then Terrebonne Parish is the one buyer's market at 6.58 months, but that's still a lot closer to a balanced market than we have been seeing throughout Terrebonne Parish since we started doing this. And the 96.1 % sold to list is a little low, but it's still solid.
This is where Terrebonne Parish outside of Houma is where the buyers have the most room to negotiate it seems like. So if you don't mind a little longer drive in the outlying areas, maybe look in Terrebonne Parish outside of Houma and you might be able to find some houses to negotiate on.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (14:22)
It's like this is why people say, well, how's the market? What's the market doing? That's the wrong question. It depends. Right. Yeah, almost. Sometimes that is the case. ⁓ A couple of months ago, we talked about the different zip codes, which for Thibodaux that's not a whole lot of difference.
Ben Harang (14:29)
Right. Like what block are you talking about almost?
Mm-hmm.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (14:46)
from the zip code in the city of Thibodaux. But when you get to Houma, you've got three different zip codes that comprise Houma at minimum. So it's a lot more nuanced and complicated when you're looking at it because it's.
Ben Harang (14:55)
Right.
And
those different zip codes have different real estate markets.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (15:07)
Yeah, some of them have multiple depending on what part of that zip code you're looking at. it's, you know, it's really, it depends on what your goals are. And again, we always come back to this, it's what you're trying to do, what you're trying to achieve and what your financial capability is.
Ben Harang (15:12)
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (15:26)
So I think the through line overall, and especially over the last couple of market updates that we've been pointing out, is that we're seeing faster sales and improving affordability. these are numbers from the whole market for the Bayou Board of Realtors. And just as a refresher, that includes Terrebonne, Lafourche, Assumption.
St. Mary and the West Bank of St. James and some of Jefferson Parish, specifically Grand Isle. The days on market until sale, 98 days for the month of April. That's down 9.3 % from 108 a year ago. There's a lot of stuff that's changed from a year ago and has changed for the positive.
the housing affordability index is up 11.2%. So that higher number means that a typical household has more buying power. Softer wide board-wide median prices plus an improving affordability index means buyers, especially first time and VA buyers, may have a better entry window than they did a year ago, even as competition for well-priced homes stays real.
So with that affordability index being up over 11 % in plain terms, what can we point out to families? What does it mean to families that were priced out a year ago?
Ben Harang (17:00)
Well, think it's the adjustment, as I was saying in a previous portion. The interest rates drive the total price of the houses that sell. They don't necessarily lower the price of a single house, but the houses that are being sold more of a lower price. And that's because when you add the interest and the principal together, you come up with the monthly note.
So the ones we're actually closing more of are the lower price and there's the affordability index that goes up. Again, the biggest driver of all of this is the interest rate. And historically, mean, we're still at the 6 % plus or minus, and historically that is absolutely a competitive rate. I used to think 7 % was long term.
a long-term viable rate, 6 % may be that rate now, but it seems like we're here and we'll be here for a while. So as families grow and people move in and out, that's the interest rate that's gonna, that people are gonna be able to borrow the money to buy the houses. And if you're not gonna borrow 6 % money, you're probably not gonna buy a house.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (18:15)
speaking of interest rates, this is just something that always, I guess it's a pet peeve of mine. And again, it's just on general principle, the news headlines will spout off about what's going on in the market. They'll spout off about what the interest rate is and all of these things. First off, they're talking in general across the whole nation.
and again, like we're talking about here, the region numbers versus the micro market numbers, they're comparing, know, what you have to look at is how our area is different from the nation. So, we're not looking at the same thing. And the second thing is for interest rates, the average interest rate that they talk about,
is typically going to be your conventional loan interest rate, which is typically going to be a little bit higher than what most of the buyers that we work with are looking at. Typically, they're going to be using a government-sponsored loan, which is going to be FHA, USDA, or Rural Development, if you prefer to call it that, or a VA loan. And those are
Ben Harang (19:18)
Mm-hmm.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (19:30)
the last couple of years, they've been almost a half a percent lower than that conventional interest rate. if you're, you know, don't go by what you're seeing in the news or what you hear and other people say. Talk to your realtor, talk to your lender and get something more specific and get it figured out.
Ben Harang (19:53)
All right, for sellers, let's kind of wrap it up here, Clint. For sellers, price to the current data and not to last year's data. If you want to sell your house in a reasonable amount of time, if you're competitive, anywhere in Lafouche and Terrebonne Parish, if you price it right, your house will sell. You're going to get 96 and some change percent of the list price on up depending exactly where you are in the market.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (20:22)
geographically.
Ben Harang (20:23)
Geographically right. Lower board-wide inventory means a well-prepared, well-priced home has less competition than it did a year ago. If you remember a while back, we were telling buyers, now's the time to get in. Now's the time to get in. Well, you still need to get in, but there's more buyers. You have more competition as buyers for fewer.
for fewer houses.
And for buyers, know which of the four markets you're shopping in. So if you're in Thibodaux, know you're in a hot market. If you're in Houma and the rest of Lafourche Parish, you're dealing with basically a balanced market. So you may get a little more concession. If you want something with more negotiating room, get in the Terrebonne Parish outside of Houma, and you might be able to find the deal you've been looking for.
But before you go, doesn't matter what the prices are, you need to be ready to react. Get pre-approved on the loan to make your offer as competitive as possible in whatever market you're in. So be prepared when you do it. You don't just wake up on a Saturday morning and say, I think I want to go look at houses today. I might buy one. That just doesn't happen.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (21:41)
doesn't fly. know, for the last three years, we've been saying, hey, you need to be pre-approved and ready to go just in case the house you're looking at is really popular. But for the last three years, that hasn't been the case. We're starting to see now that listings are getting multiple offers. And the buyers that are not prepared
are the ones that aren't getting those houses under contract.
Ben Harang (22:10)
No doubt about that. The more prepared you are when you go to buy it, the better chance you have. And chances are, your first house you want, you're probably not going to buy. You'll probably miss it. And then understand how aggressive you need to be when whatever market you're in. And you'll adjust your expectations, and you might get lucky on the second or third.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (22:10)
All right. yeah.
Now, all right, it's homework time. All right, so here's the homework. First figure out, now we specifically only talked about four different markets, but we've got access, like we mentioned, we can get down to zip code level and give you a market trend report for that. So.
Ben Harang (22:51)
Mm-hmm.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (22:55)
If want to reach out to us, if you're just curious about some market you're interested in or the market you live in, we can give you a report and let you know what that market looks like. If you're curious about what your home might sell for on the market, reach out to us. We can get that to you. your first homework is figure out which markets your home or your search actually sits in.
because that changes a lot of things depending on where it is. And if you're a seller, pull a current value estimate. And compared to what you think your home is worth, that's a fun exercise. I was doing that yesterday. Or what somebody else thought my home was worth versus what I thought it was worth. If you're a buyer,
Ben Harang (23:30)
Mm-hmm.
Yes it is.
huh.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (23:45)
Get fully pre-approved so you're ready to act. And while they're good for 30, 60, 90 days, if it expires, you can always get it refreshed, get it renewed. So it's not that big of a deal. It's never too early to start talking about it and making plans.
Ben Harang (24:06)
Right, and in the show notes that we have attached to the episode are going to be all the reports. So spend 10 minutes and look at your area, whether you're in Thibodaux or Houma, the rest of Terrebonne, the rest of Lafourche Parish. See where you're located and look at it realistically, whether it's on your house or a house you think you want to buy. And it helps you become more informed, better informed you are.
When you make the offer on the house or when you list your house for sale, the better off you're going to be when it comes time to negotiate with a buyer or seller, depending on what size you're on.
I think that wraps up our April 2026 market update. Clint, you have any wise words to close it out?
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (24:57)
Well, I'll say demand is strong, supply is tight, and the smart move depends on where you are. And since I've already gave y'all homework to reach out for a personalized read on your home's value or your buying power, where you're looking to reach, we're always glad to walk through numbers with you, reiterate that. And
Just wanted to remind everybody, don't forget to like, subscribe, comment, and share. Make sure you let your mom and them know. Or if you know of anybody that may be thinking about selling or talking about buying a house, share this episode with them. Give them some information to consider when they're starting their home journey to buy a house or looking to sell their house.
And the main thing is to go to rerealestatepodcast.com where you can listen to our episodes on the website, subscribe from whatever app or service you get your podcasts from, or even go to our YouTube channel from there and watch our radio faces. So we enjoy doing this. We hope you enjoy listening and or watching.
Ben Harang (26:09)
Yeah.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (26:14)
And if you got any questions, you can go to rerealestatepodcast.com and click on the ask a question button and we'll try and include it in a future show.
Ben Harang (26:24)
Right. I think that's it. Just a comment. Clinton and try to have fun doing this, but the more serious you take it when you're serious about buying or selling, the better you're going to be positioned in whatever market you're in to accomplish your goals, whether you're moving in, moving out, moving up, moving down, whatever your particular
situation is the more informed you are about the market, the better off you're going to be. All right, I'm done. Have a good one, Clint. We enjoyed it. There it is.
Clint C. Galliano - REALTOR® (26:55)
All right, it's another one in the can. See you later,
Ben.