LINK's July numbers are in, and they hold two facts that don't usually share a month: the biggest dollar volume of 2026, and the most inventory the island has carried all year. Both are true at once. That combination is the story.
The biggest month of 2026, on fewer trades
July closed 25 sales for $117,077,800 — the largest monthly total of the year, ahead of January's $106M and half again what June produced. It got there on 21 home sales and four lots. A year ago, July 2025 did 37 sales for $127.5M, so the island is now doing nearly the same money on two-thirds the transactions. The median told the same story: $3,305,000 across all property types, up 32% from last July's $2,500,000. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Year-to-Date Sales Summary, July 2026.)
Fewer, bigger. That has been 2026's shape all year, and July was its clearest month yet.
What actually sold
The month's headline trade was 36 Easton Street on Brant Point — $25,000,000 against a $28,500,000 ask, one of the walk-to-town waterfront houses that surfaces once a season. Behind it, the depth was in Town: eight of the 21 home sales closed in and around downtown, from $2,985,000 on Milk Street to $5,862,000 on Red Mill Lane. Madaket and West of Town posted three sales each.
Land had its own July. Four lots traded for a combined $21.0M, led by two on Nonantum Avenue in Surfside — one at $3,490,000 and one at $12,900,000, the latter at full asking price. LINK puts land absorption at three months of inventory, the tightest segment on the island; if you've been watching the land market, that scarcity is why good parcels don't linger. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Sales History and Market Snapshot, July 2026.)
97.6% of ask — and 37 price cuts. Both happened.
Here is the number I'd frame from this report: the homes that closed in July captured 97.63% of their last asking price — the strongest figure of any month in 2026. In the same 31 days, 37 listings changed price, more than double June's 16. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Year-to-Date Sales Summary and Inventory Activity, July 2026.)
Those two facts sound like they contradict each other. They don't. They're the same mechanism seen from both ends: this market pays promptly and pays nearly full price for a house priced to what the island actually trades at — and it sends everything else back for revision. The sellers who repriced in July are buying their way into the first group. The mechanics behind this — what each price band actually paid last quarter — are in the Q2 asking-versus-getting breakdown, and July's monthly numbers sit right on that pattern.
The shelf is filling
Inventory started July at 169 and ended at 178 — the most listings the island has carried at any point in 2026, and the fifth straight month it has climbed. Fifty-seven new listings came on, 27% more than last July. For perspective, the island held 223 listings a year ago, so this is still a fifth less to choose from than last summer — but the direction is unmistakable. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Inventory Activity, July 2026.)
Two details inside that number are worth a minute:
- The new listings are asking well above what just traded. July's new residential listings came on at a median ask of $5,845,000. The homes that actually closed had a median of $3,305,000. That gap is the negotiation of the next six months, written down in advance.
- Buyers are engaging with the wider shelf. Twelve offers to purchase were accepted in July against four in June, and 25 purchase-and-sale agreements were signed, up 25%. The pipeline behind the closings got busier, not quieter.
At July's sales pace, LINK puts residential absorption at 11 months of inventory. That is a real number and worth knowing — with the caveat that it's computed from a single month's pace in a market where one month can double the next.
The year to date
Through July, Nantucket has recorded 136 sales for $559.3M, against 185 sales for $647.5M in the same stretch of 2025 — count down 26%, dollars down 14%. The year-to-date home median stands at $3,478,000, up 5.4% from a year ago, and homes have captured 95.16% of asking across the year. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Year-to-Date Sales Summary, July 2026.)
The second-quarter report called this a thin market rather than a falling one. July didn't change that reading; it sharpened it.
What I do with this
With sellers, the July report is the pricing conversation in miniature. The 97.6% figure belongs only to houses priced to this month's market — the 37 price changes are what the alternative costs. If you're thinking about listing this fall, we price to the buyers who wrote twelve offers in July, not to the shelf asking $5.8M, and the valuation is where that starts.
With buyers, the leverage is broadening for the first time in a year — 178 listings, eleven months of supply at July's pace, and cuts arriving weekly. But the July numbers also say the accurately priced house still commands nearly full ask, so the real opportunity isn't lowballing the fresh listing. It's the house that has been sitting, repricing its way toward the number the market already named. I keep a running list of those, and it's the first thing we'd walk through together.
Questions I'm hearing about the July numbers
How many properties sold on Nantucket in July 2026?
Twenty-five — 21 homes and four lots — for $117,077,800, the biggest month of 2026 by dollar volume. The median home sale was $3,305,000. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Sales History and Year-to-Date Sales Summary, July 2026.)
What was the biggest sale of the month?
36 Easton Street on Brant Point at $25,000,000, against a $28,500,000 ask. On the land side, 27 Nonantum Avenue in Surfside closed at $12,900,000 — full asking price. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Sales History, July 2026.)
Is this a buyer's market now?
Broadening, not soft. The island ended July with 178 active listings, the most of 2026 but still 20% below last July, and LINK's residential absorption sits at 11 months. Yet homes closed at 97.63% of asking — the year's strongest. More choice, real leverage on the stale end of the shelf, and near-full price for the house that's priced right. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Inventory Activity and Market Snapshot, July 2026.)
Are prices up?
July's home median was $3,305,000 versus $2,693,000 a year earlier, up 22.7%, and the year-to-date home median is $3,478,000, up 5.4%. In a 21-sale month, the mix of what trades moves the median — read these as direction, not precision. (Source: LINK Nantucket, Year-to-Date Sales Summary, July 2026.)
The one-line version
July was 2026's biggest month by dollars and its most accurately priced — and it ended with more houses on the shelf than the island has carried all year, most of them asking well above what just traded.
If you want to know where your house — or the one you've been watching — sits in that picture, I'm glad to run the numbers and walk you through it. No pressure, no obligation.