# Brookline's School-Zone Winners and Losers: Where Sellers Still Get Bids and Where They Don't
What are the key takeaways?
•The short answer: In Brookline, sellers still win bidding wars in high-demand school zones like Runkle and Ridley, while slower zones like Lincoln need sharp pricing and staging to sell. Price by your school zone, not the townwide median.
•The myth: The townwide median sale price tells you what your home is worth. It doesn't.
•The reality: Brookline behaves like several separate markets. A handful of multi-million-dollar sales can yank the townwide average up in a single month.
•The bottom line: Build your list price from 90-day sales in your exact school zone — that is where the real demand lives in June 2026.
Here is the trap many Brookline sellers fall into.
You see the town's headline median home price. Then you try to use that number to set your own list price.
Don't.
That headline number tells you Brookline is expensive. It does not tell you what your home is worth.
Don't treat the townwide median like a price tag. Treat it like a weather report.
A median is just the middle number in a long list of sales. In Brookline, that list can include starter condos, classic two-families, renovated single-family homes, and multi-million-dollar estates. The "middle" may not describe your home at all.
The better question is not, "What is Brookline doing?"
The better question is: Which Brookline school-zone market are you actually selling in?
Why is Brookline really several housing markets?
Brookline is not one clean, simple market. It is several smaller markets sitting inside one town — and school zones are one of the clearest dividing lines buyers use.
That is why pricing from the townwide average can lead you in the wrong direction. A few high-end sales can pull the average up fast. That does not mean every home in town suddenly became more valuable. It means the math got noisy.
Look at the gap between property types over the last 180 days. The single-family median sale price reached $3,170,000, while condos sat near $1,009,000.
Brookline MLS Market Pulse by Property Type — Last 180 Days
A primary-source snapshot of Brookline pricing, market speed, and inventory by property segment over the last 180 days.
Single-family
Median sold price3,170,000
Median days on market29
Months of inventory13.1
Condo
Median sold price1,009,000
Median days on market25
Months of inventory15.4
Mixed
Median sold price1,120,000
Median days on market28
Months of inventory15.5
Source:Repliers / MLSPIN
Same town. Completely different buyers.
A condo buyer near $1,009,000 and a single-family buyer near $3,170,000 are usually not bidding on the same home. They typically bring different budgets, needs, timelines, and school priorities to the table.
What this means for you: your pricing power depends less on the townwide headline and more on your exact buyer pool. And in Brookline, that buyer pool is largely shaped by school zone.
Where are Brookline sellers still getting bidding wars?
If you want to know where sellers still hold real leverage — the power to stand firm because buyers are competing — start with the Runkle school zone.
Among the Brookline submarkets tracked here, Runkle posted a $2,850,000 median price, making it the high-price leader among the zones. One honest caveat: this is a mixed-segment figure covering all property types in the zone, not a single-family-only number, so read it as a submarket signal rather than a precise read on any one home type.
Selected Brookline Submarket Median Prices
Compares reported median prices for selected Brookline school-zone and neighborhood submarkets.
A high median price alone does not prove buyers are competing — it could simply reflect expensive homes. To gauge actual competition, you would also want the zone's over-asking rate, its sale-to-list ratio (where above 1.0 means homes sold for more than asked), and its days on market. Those zone-level competition figures are not shown in the median data above, so we are not going to assert them here.
That point matters for how you read all of these zone numbers. We are showing zone medians, not the full underlying sample. A zone median can be moved by a small number of sales, the same way a handful of estates can move the townwide median. Before you price off any single zone figure — Runkle's median, Ridley's speed, or Lincoln's slower pace — ask how many sales sit behind it. A confident at-market price still has to be anchored to a real, recent comp set, not a single number.
Ridley showed strength in a different way: speed.
Homes in the Ridley school zone sold in a median of just 11 days — meaning the typical home went under agreement in under two weeks, the fastest among the tracked zones.
Selected Brookline Submarket Speed: Median Days on Market
Compares median days on market across selected Brookline school-zone submarkets.
What this means for your wallet: if recent, verified comps in a high-demand zone like Runkle or Ridley show genuine competition, you may not need to "leave room" by overpricing. In fact, that approach can hurt you.
A strong at-market price pulls more buyers in at once. More buyers at once creates the pressure that leads to better offers.
Here it is worth drawing a line that sellers often blur. Pricing confidently at a defensible market value is not the same as listing above market value to "leave room to negotiate." Defensible value is the level your recent zone comps actually support. Both approaches can end with a sale above the list price, but they get there very differently. At-market pricing invites several buyers in simultaneously and lets them compete the price up. An inflated list price drives buyers away first — then forces a slow, painful walk back down. The first uses competition to lift the price. The second relies on chasing a single buyer. The winning move in these zones is not a greedy list price. It is a confident one anchored to real comps.
Where are Brookline sellers losing leverage?
The slower side of the market tells a very different story.
The Lincoln school zone posted a median of 66.5 days on market — that is how long the typical home sat listed before going under agreement — in the Bushari Team at Compass April 2026 report.
Compare that with Ridley's 11 days.
That gap matters. Same town. Very different selling experience.
A home that sits for two months sends a message to buyers. Even if the home is beautiful, they start asking: What's wrong with it?
That is why pricing matters so much in slower zones.
The national market is sending a similar warning, and it is worth being upfront about how it fits here. National data is too broad to price an individual Brookline home — that is the whole point of this article. But a clear national shift in buyer behavior still tells you which way the wind is blowing. On June 11, 2026, Realtor.com declared that "the bidding war era is over." Economist Joel Berner put it plainly:
An overpriced home doesn't just sit — it gets stale, loses leverage, and sells for less than it would have if it had been priced right from the start.
Realtor.com's June 11, 2026 analysis describes a measurable gap. Homes that close in about four weeks tend to fetch more relative to asking. Homes still sitting after roughly 18 weeks tend to sell for less than they would have early on.
What this means for you: the first few weeks are your strongest window. Miss that window and you often lose leverage — and that pressure does not stop at the Lincoln line. A Runkle seller who overprices can lose the very competition the zone might otherwise deliver.
There is one more important point for Brookline. Per USA TODAY's report on that same analysis, buyers in the $750,000–$2 million range now have the most negotiating room nationally. That is national context only, not a Brookline figure. Still, that range captures a large share of Brookline condos and some single-family homes, which is why the broad trend is worth keeping in view — even though your actual price has to come from local comps.
So if you are selling in a slower school zone, or selling a condo in that middle price band, be careful.
The playbook is straightforward: price correctly from day one, stage well, and make the home easy to love online. Clean curb appeal, bright rooms, strong photos, and no obvious buyer objections left unresolved.
Is listing high just room to negotiate?
This is one of the most common seller instincts: "I'll list high so I have room to come down."
It sounds reasonable. In today's market, it often backfires.
Real estate expert Brody Nash explained the problem in HelloNation on June 18, 2026: many buyers do not negotiate with overpriced listings. They skip them. They scroll past. They wait. Or they assume the seller is unrealistic.
Price it right and buyers come to you. Price it wrong and you're chasing them. (Joel Berner, Realtor.com)
A smart price creates urgency. A stretched price creates hesitation.
Buyers also do not price your home based on your plans. They do not pay more because you need funds for your next house, and they do not automatically pay more because you love your renovation. They compare your home with other recent sales.
That is why zone-level comps matter.
A "comp" means a comparable sale — a similar home that recently sold nearby. In Brookline, the best comps are usually not just townwide. They are in your school zone, near your home, and recent enough to reflect the current buyer mood.
How should you price a Brookline home in June 2026?
Throw out the townwide median headline as your main pricing guide. Use it for context only. Then build your list price from your exact school-zone market.
Brookline June Pricing Playbook by School Zone
Outlines a three-step June 2026 Brookline home pricing strategy based on 90-day school-zone comps, property type, and zone-specific demand intensity.
| Category | What to do | Why it works |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Pull 90-day zone comps | Get the last 90 days of sales for your exact school zone — not the town. | Recent, local sales reflect your real buyer pool. |
| 2. Split by property type | Separate condo and single-family medians. Use price per square foot with sample size. | A $1,009,000 condo and a $3,170,000 house are not the same market. |
| 3. Match strategy to zone | Confident at-market pricing in Runkle/Ridley. Sharp pricing plus staging in slower Lincoln-type zones. | Demand intensity is not equal across town. |
Your best pricing plan starts with three questions:
1. What sold in your school zone in the last 90 days?
Recent sales show what buyers are paying right now.
2. How fast are homes like yours selling?
Speed tells you whether buyers are competing or waiting.
3. Are homes selling over or under asking?
This reveals whether list prices are creating urgency or sitting too high.
One honest caution — and it cuts directly against the zone-premium strategy, so it deserves a direct answer. School-zone lines can change. Brookline can redistrict. If buyers worry about future reassignment, they may pay a smaller premium than recent comps suggest. Zone comps tell you what buyers have been paying, not a guarantee of what the next buyer will pay. That is one more reason to lean on a fresh, recent comp set rather than older sales that may have priced in a premium today's buyers discount.
But the deeper demand driver remains powerful.
Brookline has a strong reputation for schools, a family-focused buyer base, and limited housing supply. The town is largely built out, so new inventory is hard to create. Those forces continue to support demand across zones.
The new $23.25 million tax override also matters, and it deserves more than a wave-off. Higher annual carrying costs reduce some buyers' budgets, which can trim what they are willing to bid. Because the override applies townwide, it can compress premiums in every zone at once rather than only in slower ones. It does not erase the gap between faster and slower school-zone markets, but it can narrow it. The practical takeaway: do not assume last year's premium is fully intact. Re-test it against the most recent comps before you set your price.
Buyers do still appear to be active. The townwide median sold price rose year over year, and inventory tightened in May 2026.
A fair objection: that is a townwide figure — exactly the kind of broad number this article warns against using as a price tag. Read it the right way. Use the townwide trend only as a weather report, a signal that demand has not collapsed, and never as the basis for your list price. Your number still has to come from zone-level comps.
As Steve Reese told USA TODAY, "real estate is fiercely local." In Brookline, "local" often means school zone.
What is the bottom line for Brookline sellers?
If you are selling in Runkle or Ridley, you may be in one of Brookline's stronger pockets. That does not mean you can name any price. It means you may have enough demand to create competition — but only if you price correctly, and only if recent comps in your specific zone actually back that up.
If you are selling in a slower zone like Lincoln, the strategy shifts. You need sharper pricing, stronger presentation, and a serious launch plan. You cannot afford to waste your first two weeks.
The townwide median is too broad. Your feelings about the home are too personal. Your best guide is the most recent sales data from your exact school-zone market — including how many sales sit behind those numbers, so you are not pricing off a noisy small sample.
Build your list strategy from zone-level comps and the school value buyers actually pay for — not a noisy townwide median that can be moved by a handful of estates.
One honest note on scope: this article tracks a selected set of Brookline school zones — Runkle, Ridley, and Lincoln among them — not every zone in town. If your zone is not shown here, the principle still holds, but the specific medians above are not your comp set. That gap is exactly why the next step is a current, zone-specific comp pull rather than a number borrowed from this page.
If you want to know whether your Brookline home is in a "bidding-war" pocket or a "price-it-sharp" pocket, start with the school zone. That is where the real answer lives.
These figures are publicly pullable through any agent or the MLS, so the next step is a convenience, not a gate on essential information.
If you want the specific 90-day sales, days-on-market, and over-asking numbers for your Brookline school zone — including how many sales each figure is based on — reach out and ask for a zone-level pricing review before you set your list price.
