NEW YORK, May 21, 2026, 15:04 EDT
Opendoor Technologies shares traded higher Thursday afternoon, beating the broader market as investors watched the company’s turnaround efforts and reacted to new signs of strain in the U.S. housing market.
The stock gained roughly 4.3% to $4.59, after ranging from $4.26 to $4.63 during the session. Around 28 million shares changed hands. The company’s market cap stands at about $4.4 billion.
Opendoor is under pressure to show its iBuying model can hold up even with a slower, pricier housing market. The company uses tech to buy homes straight from owners and sell them again. Investors are looking beyond the big headline losses right now. They’re watching how fast Opendoor can flip homes, where inventory stands, and if the business is getting closer to adjusted EBITDA, or earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, minus certain items.
Mortgage rates keep weighing on the market. Freddie Mac said the average 30-year fixed rate hit 6.51% on May 21, up from 6.36% last week. The 15-year fixed moved to 5.85%.
Single-family housing starts in the U.S. slid 9.0% in April, hitting a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 930,000 units, according to Census Bureau data released Thursday. Permits for single-family homes also fell, down 2.6%. Higher mortgage rates, rising inventories and construction costs are pressuring the market, Reuters said.
Opendoor’s latest update was a bright spot for some bulls. CEO Kaz Nejatian said earlier this month that Opendoor reached adjusted EBITDA profitability on a 12-month forward basis as of April 1. He also pointed to acquisition contracts doubling from last quarter. First-quarter revenue came in at $720 million, down from $1.15 billion a year ago. Net loss was $173 million.
Opendoor is having a “step-function change” in margins, resale speed, and inventory health, Nejatian said. “The machine is working,” he told investors, repeating a line that’s been making the rounds.
Bull case is just this: buy well, sell fast, cut stale stock. Opendoor said 10% of its listed homes had been on the market more than 120 days at the end of Q1, down from 33% at the end of Q4.
Housing numbers aren’t straightforward. Pending home sales were up 1.4% in April, more than economists had forecast. But Nancy Vanden Houten at Oxford Economics told Reuters that home sales might stay limited through the rest of the year due to high rates, economic worries and gas prices.
Zillow Group’s Class C shares edged up, and Offerpad, a smaller iBuying rival, rose too. The SPDR S&P Homebuilders ETF, which tracks homebuilder stocks, was up about 0.9%, showing the move wasn’t just a broad selloff in housing-related names.
Investors could be pricing in operating gains for Opendoor before the housing cycle turns. The company is still losing money on a net basis. Its business is still tied to mortgage rates, home prices, financing costs, and how quickly it can flip homes. If rates stay elevated or buyers step back, Opendoor might see thinner margins or have to keep homes on its books longer. That would challenge the turnaround story that pushed the stock higher.
