Downtown West Palm Beach Condo Market Report — August 2026

The Downtown West Palm Beach condo market is running at two different speeds right now. On the resale side — the 43 MLS-tracked buildings we cover across 33401 and 33407 — a fifth of the active listings came off the market this summer without selling. On the new-construction side, four developer-sold buildings (Olara, South Flagler House, Mr. C Residences, and Alba Palm Beach) are moving contracts that a standard MLS pull never sees.

This report pulls both together, using BeachesMLS data prepared September 1, 2026.

Read August's Headline Numbers Carefully

August posted 15 resale closings at a median sale price of $690,000 and $557 per square foot, with a median of 15 days on market and a 96.1% list-to-sale ratio. Taken at face value, that is a 20.2% jump in median price and a two-thirds collapse in days on market, month over month.

Do not take it at face value. Closings post to MLS with a lag, and 15 is the count on file as of September 1 — a floor, not a final read. For context, July closed 29, June 32, May 33, and the twelve-month average is roughly 28. August will very likely land closer to that band once the records catch up, and when it does, every August figure derived from those 15 sales — median price, price per square foot, days on market — will move with them. A 15-sale month is too thin to carry a trend, and we would rather say so than sell you a 20% price jump that partially unwinds by October.

The numbers worth acting on this month are the ones built on twelve months of data. The one big current move — a 19% fall in active listings — needs explaining before it means anything at all.

Where the Inventory Went

Active resale inventory stood at 134 listings on September 1, down from 165 five weeks earlier — a 19% drop. Months of supply fell from roughly 6.25 to 4.83.

The obvious read is that the market tightened. That read is wrong, and the arithmetic says so. If those 31 listings had sold, August would have posted somewhere around 55 to 60 closings on top of an ordinary month. It did not. The twelve-month run rate is about 28, and even after August's count finishes revising upward it will land near there. The overwhelming majority of that 31-listing drop left the market without transacting.

This is a seasonal pattern in Downtown West Palm Beach, not a market signal. Sellers here — particularly at the upper end — routinely withdraw a listing during the slow summer rather than let it accumulate days on market through a quiet August and September. Those units come back in December, refreshed for season, with a new listing date and a days-on-market clock reset to zero.

So treat 4.83 months of supply as a summer artifact rather than a tightening. Expect available inventory to climb again through December as withdrawn listings return alongside genuinely new ones. The same caution applies to this month's 15-day median days on market: a relisted unit reports its days from the new list date, not from when it first came to market.

Where the drop landed is fairly uniform, which is itself the tell. Under $1M went from 95 active listings to 73, the $1M–$2M tier from 17 to 12, the $3M–$5M tier from 15 to 12. A genuine absorption story concentrates somewhere; a seasonal clear-out looks like this — broadly proportional across tiers. The exception is $5M+, which did not move at all: 24 listings then, 24 now.

If You're Buying This Fall

The unit you liked in July that vanished in August most likely did not sell. It is worth tracking rather than writing off, and many will resurface around December.

That relist is where the information asymmetry sits. A returning listing presents on the public portals as brand new — fresh date, zero days on market — with no visible trace of the months it spent unsold at a higher ask. We can pull the full listing history, including prior list dates, prior prices, and every reduction along the way. Before you make an offer on anything that looks newly listed in December, it is worth asking what that unit's actual history is. The answer frequently changes the number you should offer.

Resale Market by Price Tier

Trailing 12 months (September 2025–August 2026), 333 resale closings break down as follows:

Under $1M — 249 closings, 74.8% of the market. Median sale price $515,000 at $452/sq ft, 63 days on market. Active inventory: 73 listings, median ask $515,000 at $484/sq ft, sitting a median 99 days. The closed median and the asking median are now the same number — sellers in this tier have priced to what actually closes, which is exactly why it keeps clearing.

$1M–$2M — 51 closings, 15.3% of the market. Median sale price $1,390,000 at $847/sq ft, 49 days on market. Active inventory: 12 listings, median ask $1,332,500. This is the tightest tier in the market by a wide margin — roughly one active listing for every four sales a year. A well-prepared listing here has very little to compete with.

$2M–$3M — 12 closings, 3.6% of the market. Median sale price $2,500,000 at $1,123/sq ft, 51 days on market. Active inventory: 13 listings at a $2,500,000 median ask. Asks and closings line up exactly here as well.

$3M–$5M — 10 closings, 3.0% of the market. Median sale price $3,725,000 at $1,642/sq ft, 96 days on market. Active inventory: 12 listings, median ask $3,825,000, sitting a median 158 days — the longest-sitting active inventory of any tier.

$5M+ — 11 closings, 3.3% of the market. Median sale price $6,500,000 at $2,007/sq ft, 147 days on market. Active inventory: 24 listings at a $10,700,000 median ask and $2,020/sq ft.

That last tier deserves a second look. The closed median is $6.5M; the asking median is $10.7M. Price per square foot is nearly identical across the two — $2,007 closed against $2,020 asking — so this is not a market rejecting the price level. It is a market where the units currently listed are simply larger and more expensive than the ones that have been selling. If you are buying above $5M, you are shopping a pool with 24 options and no urgency; if you are selling there, 147 days is the normal, not the warning sign.

The Twelve-Month Trend

Monthly closings across the period ran 28, 19, 20, 33, 33, 25, 32, 34, 33, 32, 29, and August's preliminary 15 — a market that has held remarkably steady in the low-30s since December, with the usual autumn softness at the start of the window.

Over those same twelve months, the median price per square foot moved from $472 to $557. That is up roughly 18% across the year, and the August reading alone is up 12.8% year over year.

Price per square foot is the number to watch. It is far less sensitive than a median sale price to which particular units happened to close in a given month, and it has moved in one direction all year while the closing count went sideways. Flat volume with rising $/sq ft is what a supply-constrained market looks like: the same number of sales, at steadily higher prices.

Building Performance — Trailing 18 Months

One note before the numbers: this edition reports building scorecards on an 18-month window rather than 12, to give the smaller buildings enough closings to produce a meaningful median. Counts below are not comparable to last month's report.

Two City Plaza leads all buildings with 51 closings at a $1,030,000 median and $685/sq ft — and a median 10 days on market, more than twice as fast as anything else in the top 12. CityPlace South Tower follows with 45 closings ($775,000, $609/sq ft, 76 days), then Rapallo South at 41 ($591,700, $540/sq ft) and One City Plaza at 33 ($725,000, $510/sq ft), which also carries 5 pending sales — the most of any building we track.

Courtyards in CityPlace and 610 Clematis each posted 23 closings, at $430 and $363/sq ft respectively — the two most accessible entry points in the top 12, and both with a median well over two months on market.

Three buildings tied at 20 closings apiece, and the spread between them is the best illustration in this report of why building-level data beats market-level averages: Plaza of the Palm Beaches at a $1,840,000 median ($851/sq ft), The Edge at $469,375 ($424/sq ft), and The Prado at $512,500 ($459/sq ft). Identical sales velocity, four times the price.

The Prado is worth flagging on its own: 20 closings, a 28-day median days on market, and zero active listings right now. If you own there and have been waiting for a window, this is one.

Rounding out the top 12 — La Clara with 17 closings ($786,500, $644/sq ft, 111 days), The Consulate at Lands of the President with 16 ($552,500, $303/sq ft — the lowest per-foot figure in the group), and City Palms with 13 ($570,000, $529/sq ft, 124 days).

The full building-by-building scorecard — all 43 buildings, with median days on market and current active and pending counts — is in the downloadable PDF and in the data tables below.

Developer Inventory — New Construction

Olara, South Flagler House, Mr. C Residences, and Alba Palm Beach sell mostly outside MLS, through direct developer contracts. They are excluded from every market-wide figure above and reported here on their own terms — active and pending listings and asking ranges, rather than closed-sale math the MLS record cannot support. As of September 1:

Olara — 12 active listings, 12 pending, asking $2,350,000 to $8,995,000. No MLS closings yet. The even split is the thing to watch here: half of Olara's MLS-visible inventory is already spoken for.

South Flagler House — 7 active listings, 6 pending, asking $8,550,000 to $70,000,000. No MLS closings yet.

Mr. C Residences — 3 active listings, 2 pending, asking $3,880,000 to $11,922,000. No MLS closings yet.

Alba Palm Beach — 4 active listings, none pending, asking $2,500,000 to $9,950,000. Alba is the only one of the four with a closing record in MLS: 8 closings to date, all of them within the last twelve months. That makes it the single best available read on where a new downtown building actually prices when units close, as opposed to where they list.

For unit-level availability, incentive structures, and closing timelines at any of these buildings, the sales office will always have more current information than MLS coverage of pre-construction inventory, which is partial by design.

The Rest of the Pipeline

Beyond the four developer-sold buildings above, Ritz-Carlton Residences (138 units, 2027 delivery) and Nora House (117 units, 2029 delivery) round out the major new-construction projects shaping the next three years of WPB inventory. The Ritz-Carlton is nearest to delivery of the group; Nora House is furthest out, with a Walk Score of 100 and amenities built around its Dixie Highway infill site.

For buyers considering pre-construction: the typical deposit structure (roughly 10% at reservation, 10% at groundbreaking, 10% at top-off) requires liquidity planning well before closing. Our financing guide covers how construction-to-permanent financing works at delivery.

What's Driving Demand

The Brightline effect is real. MIA in 75 minutes without I-95 traffic keeps expanding the effective buyer pool for WPB beyond Palm Beach County — see our connectivity article for specifics.

Corporate relocation continues. Financial services and technology firms that planted flags in WPB during 2020–2022 are staffing up, which keeps a floor under demand in the downtown corridor, where walkable access to office space along Okeechobee Boulevard matters.

Price per square foot is rising on flat volume. Closing counts have held in the low-30s all year while the median price per square foot climbed from $472 to $557. That is a genuine, twelve-month move, and it is not explained by this summer's inventory dip — the two operate on different timescales. Steady demand meeting a downtown resale stock that nobody is adding to is the more durable explanation.

For Sellers: What's Working Right Now

If you are planning the standard withdraw-and-relist for season, the thing to think about is that you will be relisting into the same December window as everyone else who did the same. The 31 listings that came off this summer are the competition you return alongside, on top of whatever is genuinely new. Coming back a few weeks earlier than the pack, with the work already done, is worth more than a fresh listing date.

Preparation is what makes that work. Our guide to preparing your WPB condo for sale covers the improvements that move the needle, but the short version: updated lighting, fresh neutral paint, and professional photography are table stakes. What actually separates a fast close from a 100-day listing is documentation — having your HOA financials, reserve study, and rental policy summary ready for buyer review signals a well-run building and a prepared seller. Buyers who have been burned by HOA surprises elsewhere are doing more due diligence than at any point in the last five years.

One caution on pricing off this month's numbers: the August median and the 15-day median days on market are both built on a partial, seasonally thin sample. Neither is a sound basis for setting a December ask. The twelve-month price-per-square-foot trend is.

Outlook

The real test of this market is December, not August. Watch how much of the withdrawn inventory returns and what it returns priced at. If those listings come back at or near their summer asks and move, the twelve-month climb in price per square foot has genuine support. If they come back reduced, the summer withdrawal was sellers declining to test a price they already suspected was too high.

Above $5M the picture is unchanged and worth watching separately: 24 listings that did not move all summer, a $10.7M median ask against a $6.5M closed median, and 146 days on market. The closed and asking figures per square foot are within 1% of each other, so this is not a market rejecting the price level — it is a small pool of large units waiting for a small pool of buyers.

The other number to check first in next month's report is August's closing count. If it revises from 15 up into the high 20s, this month's dramatic-looking price and days-on-market swings will largely disappear, and the twelve-month trend will simply have continued.

For building-specific data, recent comparable sales, or a valuation on your current unit, contact the DO Homes Group team directly. We track every closing across all 41+ buildings we cover, and the answers to your specific questions are almost always different from the market-level averages.

Written by Christine Dekant, Realtor · DO Homes Group at Premier Brokers International — RENE, GRI, CLA, CPRES, REDM, C2EX certified.