The figure Orange Beach condo owners will see quoted this fall is a 34.73% year-over-year rise. According to the Baldwin REALTORS® September 2026 Housing Report, the "Coastal Condos" category averaged $829,255 across 94 sales in September 2026. If you're listing a unit, it's natural to start from that number. If you're buying one, it can make every asking price look reasonable.
That figure measures which condos happened to close in a given month, inside whatever boundary the MLS was using at the time. In 2026 the MLS changed how it draws its market areas and moved to a new software platform. On top of that, it reports an average built from a few dozen closings a month. Meanwhile the figures that show who holds leverage in a negotiation stayed the same or moved in the other direction.
Nine months of the same statistic
Here is the Coastal Condos line from each 2026 monthly report Baldwin REALTORS® has published so far:
| Month, 2026 | Condos sold | Average price | Avg. days on market | Avg. price vs. same month 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 72 | $533,335 | 133 | Down 20.3% |
| February | 72 | $793,468 | 128 | Up 13.10% |
| March | 105 | $637,508 | 132 | Down 0.55% |
| April | 137 | $647,996 | 112 | Up 1.19% |
| May | 132 | $686,201 | 125 | Up 2.48% |
| June | 118 | $664,806 | 137 | Down 9.19% |
| July | 84 | $713,389 | 122 | Down 10.58% |
| August | 81 | $697,805 | 129 | Down 7.17% |
| September | 94 | $829,255 | 151 | Up 34.73% |
In February the average jumped by about $260,000 from January, then fell back by more than $150,000 in March. June, July and August all came in below the year before. September then posted the biggest gain of the year. Working backward from the September figure, the September 2025 comparison month averaged roughly $615,000, which is low compared with most months of 2026. So part of the 34.73% comes from a soft comparison month a year ago.
A statistic that moves 20 points either way within a few months is mostly picking up which units happened to close. It isn't a reliable read on what a two-bedroom Gulf-view unit is worth.
The area being measured changed partway through the year
The bigger issue is that the reports no longer describe the same territory. In the January through April reports, the Resort Area is defined as Orange Beach, Fort Morgan and the parts of Gulf Shores south of Canal Road/AL-180. WKRG's May 2026 coverage of the April report uses the same definition. The May report gave no definition. It said only that updates to the MLS data set could cause slight variations. The June 2026 report added an editor's note:
"Recent updates to MLS area definitions may result in slight variations when comparing current statistics to previously published reports. Market areas are now based on objective geographic boundaries rather than legacy MLS areas."
By the August 2026 report, the Resort Area had become a list of ZIP codes, 36511, 36542, 36547 and 36561, and the warning now covered the software change too. In the report's words, "data collection and reporting processes continue to be refined within the new MLS system." The September report repeats that wording.
The software change ran on this timeline, according to the Baldwin MLS conversion FAQ and the Perchwell launch announcement:
- April 27, 2026: the first group of offices got access to Perchwell, while listings were still maintained in the old Paragon system.
- May 18 and June 1, 2026: the second and third groups got access.
- August 6, 2026: full cutover, with listing entry and maintenance moving to Perchwell.
- September 22, 2026: Baldwin REALTORS® MLS announced the transition was complete.
So September 2026 is the first full month of closings on the new platform, under ZIP-code boundaries. It's being compared with September 2025, which was recorded in Paragon under the legacy area map. The reports don't give an effective date for the boundary change, and they don't say whether Coastal Condos covers exactly the same ground as the Resort Area. What they do say, in their own notes, is that comparisons with earlier reports may not line up. A 34.73% change across that break needs that caution attached.
Averages and medians disagree, and both have reasons to
Baldwin REALTORS® reports average prices. The Alabama Center for Real Estate (ACRE) publishes a countywide Baldwin condo series using medians. Its July 2026 report put the Baldwin County condo median at $571,500 that month, down 25.8% from July 2025. In the same month, the MLS Coastal Condos average was $713,389, down 10.58%. The two cover different areas and use different measures, so neither cancels the other out.
The gap still tells you something. An average rises when a few expensive closings land in the same month, even if the typical sale doesn't change. A median sits at the middle sale and ignores how far the top ones stretch. In a month with fewer than a hundred closings, three or four large Gulf-front units can move an average a long way. ACRE says the same about its own figures: "The differing sample size (number of residential sales of comparative months) can contribute to statistical volatility, including pricing."
The September Resort Area overview has the same pattern. Closed sales fell to 173 from 187 a year earlier, while total dollar volume rose to $150,319,186 from $134,775,779. More dollars across fewer sales means the closings that did happen were larger on average. That fits a month weighted toward the high end at least as well as it fits values rising across the board.
The leverage numbers moved the other way
If condo values had really risen by a third, you'd expect units to sell faster and inventory to tighten. Neither happened.
Average days on market for Coastal Condos was 151 in September 2026, the highest of any month this year. Across the Resort Area, the September average was 131 days, up from 122 a year earlier. ACRE's July countywide condo figures show 119 days on market, 46 days slower than July 2025. Inventory of 1,059 listings worked out to 11.0 months of supply at the July sales pace. ACRE puts the point where buyers and sellers have roughly equal bargaining power at 6 months of supply.
Inventory was down 16.0% from July 2025, so the listing count itself isn't climbing. The time each listing waits for a buyer is what's growing. For a buyer, that means room to negotiate on condition, closing timelines and price. For a seller, a list price based on the September average will likely sit through a long marketing period and then come down.
The longer pipeline adds its own pressure. FOX10 reported in March 2026 that Margaritaville Resort Orange Beach, across the Intracoastal Waterway from The Wharf, was under construction with about 300 units and a full opening expected in the fourth quarter of 2027. The Wharf's May 2025 groundbreaking announcement described more than 400 residences across condos, condo-hotel units, cottages, bungalows and villas, with starting prices expected in the mid-$500,000s. The two counts differ and may describe different phases or scopes. Either way, new Orange Beach inventory is set to arrive at a price point that overlaps the resale middle of the market.
Pricing one unit when the summary statistic is unreliable
When the countywide numbers are this noisy, the useful evidence is close to the unit itself. For a specific Orange Beach condo, these hold up better than a monthly average:
- Closed sales in the same building over the last six to twelve months, adjusted for floor, view line and bedroom count. These come from inside a single tower, so they don't depend on area definitions.
- How long those comparable units sat before closing, next to the 151-day September Coastal Condos average. A building that sells faster than the area deserves a different list price strategy than one that sells slower.
- List-to-sale gaps on recent closings in the building, which show how much negotiating actually happened.
- The building's competition today, meaning active listings in comparable Gulf-front or bay-side towers, since buyers comparing units see all of them at once.
Our earlier post on selling an Orange Beach condo with less stress covers preparation and timing. A building-level price opinion is available through the home valuation page. For a sense of how one blended figure can hide two different markets next door, see the Canal Road line in Gulf Shores.
Questions that come up
Is there an Orange Beach-only condo figure in the monthly reports? No. The Baldwin REALTORS® area stats publish Coastal Condos as one category. Orange Beach sits inside ZIP 36561, one of the four ZIP codes in the current Resort Area definition.
Did a new tower closing all at once cause the September jump? No published report connects the September average to a specific project's closings. Several Orange Beach towers were under construction as of early 2025, but none has been publicly tied to closings in fall 2026.
When will year-over-year comparisons be reliable again? Once both months being compared were recorded under the ZIP-code definitions on the Perchwell platform. With the full cutover on August 6, 2026, that likely means late summer 2027 at the earliest. The MLS hasn't announced a date.
Do the September numbers mean Orange Beach condos are losing value? They don't show that either. The figures show long marketing times and a countywide supply level ACRE puts well above balanced. That points to buyers having the edge in negotiation, and it doesn't settle where any one building's values are heading.
If you own an Orange Beach condo and want to know where your unit stands against its own building's sales, or you're a buyer weighing whether this fall's numbers leave room to negotiate, Stacy Burgos Rodgers can walk through the building-level sales with you, calmly and without pressure. Let's Connect.
