By ALEX VEIGA, Associated Press Business Writer

The U.S. housing market slump dragged into its fourth year in 2025 as sales remained stuck at a 30-year low with rising home prices and elevated mortgage rates keeping many prospective home shoppers out of the market.

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Sales of previously occupied U.S. homes totaled 4.06 million last year, flat versus 2024, when sales sank to the lowest level since 1995, the National Association of Realtors said Wednesday. Sales have declined on annual basis every year since 2022.

The median national home price for all of last year rose 1.7% to $414,400, the NAR said.

Sales have been stuck at around a 4-million annual pace now going back to 2023. That’s well short of the 5.2-million annual pace that’s historically been the norm.

The U.S. housing market has been in a sales slump dating back to 2022, when mortgage rates began to climb from pandemic-era lows. The average rate on a 30-year mortgage was around 7% a year ago and remained elevated for much of the year until late summer, when they began to ease, falling to close to 6% by the end of the year, according to Freddie Mac.

That recent pullback in mortgage rates helped drive existing U.S. home sales 5.1% higher in December from the previous month, the fastest sales pace in nearly three years.

Even so, affordability remains a challenge for many aspiring homeowners, especially first-time buyers who don’t have equity from an existing home to put toward a new home purchase. Uncertainty over the economy and job market are also keeping many would-be buyers on the sidelines.

By Todd Woody, Bloomberg News

The elimination of U.S. tax credits for residential heat pumps, solar panels and batteries will make electrifying your home more expensive in 2026, and tariffs and made-in-America mandates could add additional costs.

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Just how pricey remains to be seen. New financing models could help keep some solar and battery costs in check, according to Emily Walker, director of insights at online solar marketplace EnergySage.

Here’s what you need to know.

The tax credit repeal’s impact on prices

The expiration of the 30% federal tax credit for solar and battery installations at the end of 2025 doesn’t necessarily make the equipment more costly to buy but for homeowners with a tax liability, it does end the ability to reduce or erase their tax bill. A typical solar and battery system generated tax credits worth about $10,000.

You can still save by leasing

Tax credits remain for leased solar systems through the end of 2027, though the installer receives the incentive and passes on the savings to homeowners through lower monthly payments or other cost reductions.

A new model of solar ownership is emerging

Walker said installers who sold systems are now switching to a new model that lets residents ultimately own their solar and battery arrays while securing the savings from leasing. Called lease-to-own or a prepaid lease, a homeowner pays for the cost of the system upfront and the installer passes on the tax credit benefits as a discount. The solar company must retain ownership for a certain number of years under the tax code but then transfers title to the homeowner.

Southern California installer SolarShoppers sells its systems but company president Shawn Heckerman said he estimates that prepaid leases will account for nearly all of his business in 2026. Like other solar installers, he anticipates that demand will initially soften but recover later in the year. “I expect us to have a better year in 2026 than the last one, even with the tax credit expiring,” he said.

That’s due to soaring electricity rates and temperatures that force residents to run their air conditioners. “When we get into the summer, customer calls spike when they get their first high utility bill,” said Heckerman.

Walker also expects homeowners to continue adding panels as they install electric vehicle chargers and replace fossil fuel appliances with induction stoves and heat pumps. That can make going solar still financially attractive in the long run, even if the absence of federal incentives means adding a couple of years to the time it takes for the energy savings to equal the cost of the system, she said.

“When you’re talking about something that’s producing electricity for 25 years, it’s really just a blip,” said Walker.

New rules could raise the cost of solar panels and batteries

To receive the tax credit, leased systems must comply with new domestic manufacturing requirements that took effect Jan. 1, 2026. The federal government, though, has yet to issue final guidance on what percentage of components from China and other countries are prohibited under the Trump tax bill enacted in July.

Tariffs will also add costs

The U.S. imports most of its solar panels from China, Vietnam and other countries subject to tariffs. Nearly all batteries for residential energy storage are made in China.

Tariffs and manufacturing mandates will likely push up prices, according to analysts, but Walker said that will encourage the industry to focus on cutting “soft costs” like permitting and paperwork that result in U.S. residents paying significantly more for solar energy than those in Australia and Europe.

How heat pumps are affected

Homeowners have also lost the $2,000 federal tax credit for heat pumps that can warm and cool dwellings and provide hot water. But Francis Dietz, a spokesperson for industry group AHRI, noted that most heat pumps didn’t qualify for the incentive, which was only for the most efficient and expensive models.

“You can still get your basic or basic-plus heat pump and don’t have to worry about the tax credit going away, so it won’t make a big difference for the average consumer,” he said.

The U.S. imported 382,000 heat pumps, mainly from China and Mexico, out of 4.1 million of the devices that shipped in 2024, according to AHRI and the United Nations. But prices may rise modestly as domestically assembled heat pumps use Chinese components subject to tariffs.

©2026 Bloomberg News. Visit at bloomberg.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street is drifting lower again on Wednesday following mixed profit reports from several big banks.

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The S&P 500 slipped 0.3% and was on track for a second straight drop after setting its all-time high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 84 points, or 0.2%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.5% lower.

Some nervousness was hanging over financial markets. Crude prices added roughly 1% to their big recent gains as protests in Iran could lead to disruptions in the flow of oil. Gold’s price climbed nearly 1% toward further records, while Treasury yields edged lower as investors looked for investments that are considered safer to hold.

On Wall Street, Wells Fargo helped pull the U.S. stock market lower after falling 4.5%. The San Francisco-based bank reported weaker profit and revenue for the latest quarter than expected, with analysts citing lower trading fees and other miscellaneous items.

Bank of America fell 3.4% despite reporting stronger profit than expected. Citigroup, which is in the midst of a turnaround under CEO and Chair Jane Fraser, lost an initial gain to slip 0.3% after its results fell short of forecasts.

Companies across industries need to report strong growth in profits to justify how high their stock prices have run recently. Analysts are looking for businesses across the S&P 500 to report earnings per share for the final three months of 2025 that are roughly 8% higher than a year earlier, according to FactSet.

Exxon Mobil added 1.3% and was one of the strongest forces keeping the S&P 500 from a steeper loss. It rose as the price of a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude added 0.8% to bring its gain for the year so far to 7%.

In the bond market, Treasury yields inched lower following some mixed reports on the U.S. economy.

One said that shoppers spent more at U.S. retailers in November than economists expected. That could be an encouraging signal about the main engine of the U.S. economy, but economists pointed to some concerning signals were underneath the surface. Sales of big-ticket items fell from the prior year, noted Brian Jacobsen, chief economic strategist at Annex Wealth Management.

A separate report said prices rose modestly at the U.S. wholesale level in November. It followed a report on Tuesday that said inflation at the U.S. consumer level was close last month to economists’ expectations, though it remained above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury ticked down to 4.15% from 4.18% late Tuesday. The two-year Treasury yield, which more closely tracks expectations for what the Fed will do, fell more modestly. It dipped to 3.52% from 3.53%.

In stock markets abroad, Japan’s Nikkei 225 rallied 1.5% to another record expectations grew that Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi may call general elections soon.

Indexes were mixed elsewhere. Stocks rose 0.6% in Hong Kong but fell 0.3% in Shanghai after a report showed China’s trade surplus surged 20% in 2025 to a record despite President Donald Trump’s tariffs.

AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed.

By JOEY CAPPELLETTI, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin has been notified that the Trump administration is investigating her after she organized and appeared in a video with other Democrats urging military service members to resist “illegal orders.”

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Slotkin, a former CIA analyst, first disclosed to The New York Times that prosecutors were investigating her. A person with knowledge of the situation who was not authorized to speak about it publicly confirmed the matter to The Associated Press.

Slotkin, who organized the 90-second video and first posted it on her X account in November, learned this month of the inquiry from the office of U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, the Justice Department’s chief prosecutor in the nation’s capital. Pirro’s office did not immediately respond Wednesday to messages seeking comment.

The inquiry marks another escalation in President Donald Trump’s reaction to a video that he and his aides have labeled as “seditious” — an offense Trump said on his social media account was “punishable by death.” Slotkin and the other Democratic lawmakers who participated in the video said in November that the FBI has contacted them to begin scheduling interviews. Pirro’s involvement represents an elevation of the matter for Slotkin.

It is not clear what laws could have been violated in the video message. In it, the lawmakers, all of whom have military and national security experience, tell troops to follow established military protocols by not following commands that the law.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has censured Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, a former Navy pilot and astronaut, for participating. Hegseth is attempting to retroactively demote Kelly from his retired rank of captain. The senator is suing Hegseth to block those proceedings, calling them an unconstitutional act of retribution.

Reps. Jason Crow of Colorado, Chris Deluzio of Pennsylvania, Maggie Goodlander of New Hampshire and Chrissy Houlahan of Pennsylvania also appeared in the video. It was not clear whether any other participants are being targeted by Pirro’s office or other arms of the Justice Department beyond the FBI questioning.

Slotkin was among the Democrats’ bright spots in the 2024 election, winning an open Senate seat despite Trump carrying Michigan in the presidential election. She delivered the Democratic response to his congressional address in 2024.

Associated Press writer Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.