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Market TrendsPublished September 25, 2026
How Fast Are Homes Selling in the Philadelphia Area?
How Fast Are Homes Selling in the Philadelphia Area?
If you're buying a home in the Philadelphia area, knowing that homes are selling "quickly" doesn't tell you much about what to expect in the places you're actually considering. A home in one ZIP code may typically go under contract in a matter of weeks, while homes just a few towns or neighborhoods away may take considerably longer.
At Premier Home Team, we help buyers navigate these differences across Philadelphia, Bucks, Montgomery, Delaware, and Chester counties. One number we look at is days on market (DOM), the number of days between when a home is listed and when it goes under contract.
To show you how much market speed can vary by location, we analyzed current days-on-market data across 230 Philadelphia-area ZIP codes. Below, you'll see how quickly homes are selling across the five counties, where some of the biggest differences appear, and what those numbers can tell you as a buyer.
Philadelphia Counties and Neighborhoods, Ranked by Days on Market
| County | Median DOM | Fastest-Moving Named Area | Slowest-Moving Named Area |
| Delaware | 34.5 days | Thornton (15 days) | Chester (68 days) |
| Chester | 36.5 days | Honey Brook (14 days) | Oxford (77 days) |
| Montgomery | 37 days | Oreland (13 days) | Bala Cynwyd (73 days) |
| Bucks | 39.5 days | Furlong (17 days) | Perkasie (54 days) |
| Philadelphia | 49 days | Eastwick / 19153 (19 days) | Center City West / 19103 (85 days) |
There's a 14.5-day gap between the fastest-moving county (Delaware) and the slowest (Philadelphia), a typical Philadelphia listing sits roughly 42% longer than a typical Delaware County listing.
💡 LOCAL TAKE
A single citywide number hides more than it shows. Real estate is hyper-local, and neighborhoods can perform very differently from the ones right next door, so an average like that only gives you a rough read on what's happening. It has its uses, but if you want information you can actually act on, you need to know the days on market in the specific area you're looking at. That's what tells you who really has the leverage, the buyer or the seller, and helps you prepare for the market you're about to step into.
How We Measured Days on Market
This analysis covers a single point-in-time snapshot across 230 ZIP codes in the five-county Philadelphia area from Reventure, refreshed August 21, 2026. This is not a rolling multi-month average. A few things worth knowing before you read the numbers:
- Low-population ZIP codes can swing sharply on just a handful of sales, so we've stuck to larger, established communities for the named examples below;
- ZIP codes don't line up perfectly with neighborhood boundaries (names like Eastwick or Rittenhouse reflect common usage, not official MLS or Census lines);
- This is a single snapshot, not a trend, some towns in this download moved by 100+ days compared to our prior data.
Fastest-Moving Philadelphia Neighborhoods
Within the city, individual ZIP codes vary by more than 4x, from a 19-day median in the fastest-moving area to 85 days in the slowest.
| Neighborhood (ZIP) | Median Days on Market | Population |
| Eastwick (19153) | 19 days | 13,018 |
| West Torresdale (19154) | 25 days | 33,796 |
| Somerton (19116) | 28 days | 33,654 |
| Washington Square West / Chinatown (19107) | 80 days | 14,825 |
| Center City West / Rittenhouse (19103) | 85 days | 25,900 |
Eastwick posts the fastest median DOM in the city, backed by a population base large enough that it isn't a thin, easily-skewed sample, West Torresdale and Somerton aren't far behind, and both carry substantial populations of their own. At the other end, Washington Square West/Chinatown and Center City West, both dominated by condo and mixed-use inventory, post the slowest medians in the city.
💡 LOCAL TAKE
What separates a 19-day ZIP code from an 85-day one usually comes down to two factors. The first is price point. The pool of buyers who can afford today's prices is smaller, and that affordability squeeze drives a lot of the speed, or velocity, at which a ZIP code sells. Different areas move at different speeds, but price is behind most of it.
The second is investor activity. Investors compare the rent a property can generate to what it costs to acquire, and the areas with the strongest fundamentals on that math attract the most investor volume. A town like Eastwick gets both at once: the affordability push pulling in owner-occupant buyers, plus investor demand on top of it. Put those two together and you get a market moving at a genuinely rapid pace.
County Snapshots: Days on Market Beyond Philadelphia's Neighborhoods
Bucks County
Bucks County (39.5-day median, 48 ZIPs) is the slowest-moving suburban county, though still well ahead of Philadelphia. Furlong (17 days), Richlandtown (15 days), and Dublin (3 days) are the fastest-moving named towns; Perkasie (54 days), a well-established town of 27,000+ residents, is the clearest example of a slower-moving pocket.
Chester County
Chester County (36.5-day median, 38 ZIPs): Honey Brook (14 days), Nottingham (15 days), and West Chester Borough (23 days) move fastest. Oxford (77 days, population 18,231) and Kennett Square (62 days) are slower, and large enough that it isn't a thin-sample fluke.
Delaware County
Delaware County (34.5-day median, 38 ZIPs) is the fastest-moving county overall. Thornton (15 days), Woodlyn (22 days), and Clifton Heights (26 days) move fastest. The City of Chester (68 days) and Darby (58 days), both well-populated communities rather than thin outlier ZIPs, stand out at the slower end.
Montgomery County
Montgomery County (37-day median, 59 ZIPs): Oreland (13 days), Dresher (14 days), and Harleysville (19 days) lead the pace, but Main Line communities Bala Cynwyd (73 days) and Gladwyne (60 days) run well above the county median.
💡 LOCAL TAKE
Across the Philadelphia area, this same pattern shows up again and again: the towns moving fastest score high on affordability and pair that with a strong school district. Towns with both of those going for them have largely been immune to the slowdown the rest of the country, and the rest of the region, has seen. Oreland, Dresher, and Harleysville are a good example: strong school districts, but still a high level of affordability.
What Days on Market Means for Buyers
Days on market is a direct measurement, not an interpretation: it's the number of days between a home's listing date and the date it goes under contract.
A lower figure means homes in that area have been going under contract faster in this snapshot; a higher figure means they've been taking longer. DOM by itself doesn't say why a given area is moving fast or slow, that can reflect price, condition, inventory levels, buyer demand, financing conditions, or some combination.
💡 LOCAL TAKE
Days on market is one of the best tools a buyer has for reading a market, if you know how to use it. It gives you an overall sense of how hot or cold things are: the higher the number, the more leverage a buyer has; the shorter it is, the less leverage a buyer has.
That said, I don't think most people choose their ZIP code based on where they'll have the most leverage, that's more how an investor thinks. Most buyers are choosing where they want to live for other reasons. But days on market is still a really valuable tool for understanding how to win in the market you've picked, and how to do it without putting more of your money at risk than you need to.
What's missing from the headline number is context: the direction it's moving. If days on market is at 34 and coming down from 40, the market's heating up, and you get a chance to get ahead of the curve by being aggressive before other buyers realize they need to be. The inverse is true too. If it's at 36 and climbing from 30, the market's cooling, and you can make more fiscally responsible decisions on your offer because you know it's not as hot as it used to be.
The catch is that sellers are usually the last to get the message. When a market cools, it takes time for sellers to respond by lowering their price, and when a market heats up, it takes time for them to raise it to what buyers are actually willing to pay. Knowing where days on market sits compared to a few months or a year ago tells you your own leverage, and it tells you where the seller's head is at, so you can put together an offer that actually works.
How Can You Use Days on Market When Buying a Home in the Philadelphia Area?
The Philadelphia-area housing market can look very different depending on where you're searching. In this snapshot, median days on market ranges from 34.5 days in Delaware County to 49 days in Philadelphia, and the differences become even larger when you look at individual ZIP codes.
Knowing those numbers gives you a better picture of how quickly homes have been going under contract in the areas you're considering. It doesn't tell you why they're moving at that pace or predict how quickly the next home you like will sell. That's where understanding the individual property and what's happening in that local market matters.
As you narrow your search, look beyond the broad Philadelphia-area averages and pay attention to what's happening in the specific towns, neighborhoods, and ZIP codes you're considering.
Want to see how quickly homes are selling in the areas you're considering? Download our Philadelphia Metro Days on Market Guide for the complete breakdown of all 230 ZIP codes across Philadelphia, Bucks, Montgomery, Delaware, and Chester counties, sorted from fastest to slowest.
If you want help understanding what these numbers mean for your home search, Premier Home Team can show you what we're seeing in the specific areas you're considering.
Frequently Asked Questions About Days on Market
What does "days on market" actually measure?
Days on market (DOM) measures the average number of days a home is listed before going under contract. Lower DOM = homes that have been going under contract faster; higher DOM = homes have that been taking longer to go under contract.
How often is this data updated, and are the neighborhood names official?
This snapshot reflects a single data pull, refreshed August 21, 2026 — rankings can and do shift between pulls, so treat any single ZIP's number as a current read, not a permanent label (several towns swung by 100+ days compared to our prior pull). Neighborhood names like Eastwick or Rittenhouse reflect common usage, not official MLS or Census-defined boundaries.
Robin Martin
Realtor® | Premier Home Team | Keller Williams Empower | PLACE
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