Has Tulum real estate hit the bottom?

Why are people suddenly asking if Tulum real estate has hit the bottom?

Because prices and sales have already dropped a lot, so buyers are looking for a floor, but there's still too much unsold property to call it.

InfoHabitat's analysis of Softec data, published by El Economista in July 2026, shows Tulum residential sales fell from 3,487 units in 2023 to 1,711 in 2025. Sales were cut in half in two years. Monthly sales per development dropped from 1.4 units in 2022 to 0.9 in 2025.

Supply is still huge. Maya Ocean's database, updated on October 21, 2026, lists 3,871 available units in Tulum, including 2,472 condos. It only covers the projects it tracks, so it's not a full count, but it shows how much choice buyers have.

On top of that, the news has turned worse in the last few weeks, with airlines cancelling Tulum routes. So the real question is no longer "will it fall?" but "how much stock still has to clear before sellers stop cutting?"

Tulum housing indicator	Earlier level	Latest comparable level	Change	What we see
Annual residential sales	3,487 in 2023	1,711 in 2025	About -51%	Buyers pulled back sharply
Monthly sales per development	1.4 in 2022	0.9 in 2025	About -36%	Projects take longer to sell
Units under construction	1,466 in 2017	13,266 in 2023	About +805%	The boom created a huge pipeline
Units available on Maya Ocean	—	3,871 (October 2026)	—	Buyers still have plenty of choice

Why is it so hard to know the real price of a Tulum condo today?

Because asking prices stay firm while the real deal gets cheaper underneath them.

There's no Tulum index of what condos actually sell for. The SHF index still showed Quintana Roo house prices up 11.5% in the second quarter of 2026, but it follows mortgage-financed homes, and Tulum is mostly cash buyers, presales and investor condos. That headline says almost nothing about a one-bedroom in Aldea Zamá.

Most local data come from developer inventories and listings, which show the advertised price, not the price paid. A developer can keep a condo listed at $200,000 (MXN 3.72 million) while throwing in furniture, paying closing costs, stretching the payment plan or quietly accepting a lower offer. A resale owner can leave a listing untouched for months, then take much less because rental income no longer covers the costs.

Units also got smaller. InfoHabitat found sale prices rose 39% between 2021 and 2025 while construction costs rose 47%, and developers protected headline prices partly by shrinking apartments. Compare price per m² and what's included, not the sticker price.

Did Tulum simply build too many condos?

Yes, Tulum built far more investor housing than the market could absorb.

Units under construction went from 1,466 in 2017 to 13,266 in 2023, about nine times more in six years. Homes for sale climbed from 3,243 in 2019 to 6,340 in 2023. Then demand weakened, and annual sales fell to 1,711 in 2025.

The 6,340 homes for sale in 2023 equal about 3.7 years of sales at the 2025 pace, and that doesn't count everything still in the construction pipeline. It's a rough order of magnitude, not a live count of unsold homes, but the direction is clear.

Much of the boom was sold on one idea: buy a condo, put it on Airbnb, collect a good return while it appreciates. When rental returns weakened, thousands of near-identical units ended up competing for a smaller pool of buyers. That overhang is the biggest obstacle to a clean bottom.

Supply measure	Earlier level	Boom level	Change	Why it matters
Units under construction	1,466 in 2017	13,266 in 2023	About +805%	Supply expanded extraordinarily fast
Housing for sale	3,243 in 2019	6,340 in 2023	+96%	Available stock almost doubled
Annual sales	3,487 in 2023	1,711 in 2025	-51%	Demand weakened after supply surged
2023 inventory vs. 2025 sales pace	—	About 3.7 years	—	Clearing the excess takes time

Have Tulum condo prices already fallen enough?

Some condos already look heavily repriced, but generic investment units can still get cheaper if sellers need cash.

There's no single percentage for the whole town. The drop depends on when the owner bought, the project, whether it's finished, the area, the unit type and how badly the seller wants out. Ordinary studios, one-bedrooms and two-bedroom investor units are under much more pressure than beachfront homes, established villas or truly unusual properties.

Back in 2025, the head of Quintana Roo's developers' association was already describing Tulum as badly oversupplied, while Cancún, Playa del Carmen and Puerto Morelos kept appreciating. Nothing since suggests Tulum has regained pricing power.

What has changed is who you negotiate with. Many sellers bought in the boom, lived through disappointing rental income and have accepted that their original exit price is gone. That's why good individual deals exist before the market has bottomed.

A 20% discount isn't automatically cheap, though. If the original price assumed an 8% or 10% rental return that never came, the right price can still be much lower.

What price should you aim for in Tulum right now?

Aim at or below the area median per m², and use the seller's weak position to get there.

TuLugar's October 2026 listings put Tulum's median condo asking price at about $213,000 (MXN 3.96 million), around $2,750 per m², and about $158,000 (MXN 2.94 million) for a one-bedroom. Propiedades.com shows apartments asking about MXN 44,700 per m² in La Veleta (USD 2,400) and MXN 47,300 in Aldea Zamá (USD 2,540). These are asking prices: a fair deal lands under them, not above.

Price cuts are already visible. In October 2026, a 153 m² two-bedroom in Aldea Zamá was listed at $175,000 after a reduction, well below TuLugar's $267,000 median for two-bedrooms.

What to do: compare the price per m² with the area median and walk away from anything well above it; ask how many units are still unsold in the project; check the price against real rental statements, not the brochure; and use the seller's monthly costs (HOA, taxes, upkeep) as an argument. In a market where sales halved, a seller who won't move on price, furniture or closing costs probably hasn't met many real buyers.

Are Tulum property sales finally starting to recover?

Not yet. The latest sales data still point down.

InfoHabitat's numbers put annual sales at 1,711 in 2025, against 3,487 two years earlier, and monthly sales per development also weakened. No newer Tulum sales series has been published that shows a turn.

The bottom doesn't need sales back at the old peak. Markets usually turn before volumes recover. What we'd want to see first is a change of direction: sales that stop falling for a few periods, finished stock being absorbed, and sellers no longer needing bigger and bigger concessions. We don't have that yet. The market feels closer to capitulation than to a recovery, which is good for bargain hunters but isn't a bottom.

Is Tulum's unsold condo inventory actually coming down now?

A bit at the source, but available stock is still far too large to call the excess cleared.

Maya Ocean's October 21, 2026 update lists 3,871 available units across 213 tracked developments, including 2,472 condos, with a median price of about $209,000 (MXN 3.89 million) and about $3,090 per m². The site's coverage changes over time, so a drop in its counts doesn't mean homes were sold.

These aren't audited counts of finished unsold homes. They mix ready units with presales. Still, one database alone showing about 2,500 condos for sale gives buyers plenty of alternatives.

The encouraging part: few developers can now launch a generic condo project and expect it to sell out to investors. That should slow new supply. Existing stock, however, still needs buyers.

Is Tulum's Airbnb glut finally clearing?

Yes, fast, and it's the strongest sign that the correction is getting late.

AirDNA counts about 3,608 active short-term rentals in Tulum in September 2026, 73.1% fewer than a year earlier. Part of that may come from Quintana Roo's new registration rules (state and municipal licences plus the RETUR-Q register) and from how AirDNA counts active listings, so it's not all owners giving up.

The survivors fill more nights: occupancy is up 17% to 46%, and average annual revenue per active listing is up 60.5% to about $17,400 (MXN 324,000). Careful: that's largely a survivor effect. Remove thousands of weak listings and the average of the rest looks better without any more tourists.

Prices are still soft. The average nightly rate is down 23.6% to about $125, and RevPAR, the revenue per available night, is down 10.7% to $58. Hosts are filling nights by charging less. That cleanup has to happen before property values can settle, but it's not finished.

Tulum short-term rental metric (AirDNA)	Current level	YoY change	What it tells us
Active listings	About 3,608	-73.1%	Supply is being removed quickly
Occupancy	46%	+17%	Surviving rentals are filling more nights
Average annual revenue	About $17,400	+60.5%	Remaining operators are doing better on average
Average daily rate	About $125	-23.6%	Guests still have pricing power
RevPAR	$58	-10.7%	Rental pricing has not recovered

Are Tulum Airbnb returns actually getting better now?

For surviving hosts, a little. For a typical investor condo bought at boom prices, not enough.

AirDNA's averages look good at first, but RevPAR is still down 10.7%. Airbtics, which tracks listings differently, puts the median Tulum vacation rental at about MXN 231,000 a year (USD 12,400), down 10.8% over three years. Half of listings earn less than that.

Take a $200,000 condo earning AirDNA's average of $17,400 a year. That's 8.7% gross, before management, platform fees, cleaning, electricity, furniture, HOA fees, maintenance, taxes and empty weeks. Net, it quickly becomes an ordinary return: after 35% of costs and the 25% tax a non-resident pays on gross rent (about $4,350), about $6,960 is left, or 3.5%.

That gap between the return buyers were promised and what units actually earn is still pushing resale prices down. Rental income alone doesn't yet put a strong floor under every investment condo.

Is tourism in Tulum finally recovering?

No, it's still falling, and that keeps pressure on both hotels and investment property.

Quintana Roo's tourism figures put Tulum hotel occupancy at 63.69% from January to July 2026, against 72.67% in the same months of 2025. For the first half alone, it was 66.18%, down from 74.32%, a drop of 8.13 points.

That's much worse than the rest of the state. In the first half of 2026, Quintana Roo's overall occupancy fell 2.95 points, Playa del Carmen 4.47 and Cancún 2.02. Tulum averaged 73.8% in 2024 and 69.1% in 2025 before falling again.

Hotels and Airbnbs aren't the same market, but both need people wanting to stay in Tulum. The rental cleanup is visible, while demand is still weakening. That's the main reason we won't call the bottom today.

Hotel occupancy	2024	2025	H1 2026	Change vs. H1 2025
Tulum	73.8%	69.1%	66.18%	-8.13 pts
Playa del Carmen	75.3%	70.8%	72.58%	-4.47 pts
Cancún	76.1%	72.8%	75.08%	-2.02 pts
Quintana Roo overall	74.7%	71.3%	72.87%	-2.95 pts

Didn't the new Tulum airport bring enough new buyers and tourists?

No. The airport made Tulum easier to reach, but its traffic is now falling.

Felipe Carrillo Puerto International Airport opened at the end of 2023 and became a favorite argument in property brochures. Federal aviation data (AFAC), reported by El Economista in August 2026, show about 471,500 passengers in the first half of 2026, down 33.2% from roughly 705,400 a year earlier. International traffic fell 40.8%, from 417,600 to 247,100.

A young airport swings with airline schedules, and Mexican international aviation has been softer overall, so this doesn't prove the airport has failed. It does show the airport hasn't brought the wave of foreign demand that was supposed to absorb Tulum's condo surplus. In the boom, buyers paid for what the airport might do. Now we can measure what it actually does.

Why are airlines dropping Tulum, and what does it mean for property owners?

Because costs went up and too many seats to Tulum were flying empty, and fewer flights means fewer guests and fewer buyers for the next season at least.

Aeroméxico stopped flying to Tulum on September 30, 2026, and Volaris suspends all its Tulum routes from January 7, 2027, citing rising costs and its least-full flights. American Airlines is dropping its Miami route while keeping Dallas, according to El Imparcial in October 2026. Copa, Avianca, JetBlue and Discover had already cancelled routes, and Delta, United and Air Canada cut frequencies. Bloomberg Intelligence expects seat capacity to Tulum to fall about 72% this quarter, against about 3% for Cancún.

New luxury hotel projects (Faena, a UMusic hotel planned for December 2026) are betting on a quieter, higher-end Tulum. That may work over time, but it doesn't fill an Airbnb this winter.

What to do: don't pay anything for "airport upside"; check which routes still serve Tulum on the dates your guests would travel; assume most guests will come through Cancún, about two hours away by road; and run your rental numbers on low-season occupancy. If you already own, expect a weak 2026–2027 high season and price your rental accordingly instead of waiting for bookings.

Why is Tulum struggling more than Cancún or Playa del Carmen?

Because much more of Tulum's boom was built for investors than for people who need somewhere to live.

Cancún and Playa del Carmen have larger permanent populations and deeper local economies. Families, workers and long-term renters create housing demand that doesn't vanish when Airbnb returns drop. Tulum's newer condo districts depend far more on tourism, short-term rentals and appreciation. When those weakened, many owners tried to sell to the same investors at the same time.

The numbers back this up. Tulum's hotel occupancy fell 8.13 points in the first half of 2026, against 2.02 for Cancún, and airlines are cutting Tulum much harder than Cancún. Tulum needs a deeper inventory cleanup before normal supply and demand return.

Is it safe to buy a presale in Tulum right now?

Only with a lot of checking. In a market this weak, a presale is where you're most likely to lose money.

Quintana Roo's urban development agency, SEDETUS, closed 18 developments in Tulum in the six months to February 2026 for breaking the rules, some built in the jungle without permits or sold on ejido land. Statewide, it had 123 irregular developments on its list in August 2026, and Tulum leads it. In early October 2026 it warned the public about two more Tulum projects, Yaax Taanil Kaah and Zonot Kaahah, for lacking urban permits.

Slow sales add a second risk: a developer who sells less than one unit a month may run out of cash before finishing. And in a falling market, a finished resale often costs less than a presale, with none of the delivery risk.

What to do: avoid ejido land unless it has been fully converted to private title; ask for the urban, environmental and construction permits and check them with the municipality; have your own notary check the title; never wire money without an escrow or a trust in place; and favor finished buildings with a few years of real rental history.

Which Tulum properties could already be near the bottom?

Finished properties that are hard to copy may already be close; interchangeable investor condos still carry the most downside.

A studio in a project surrounded by dozens of similar ones gives buyers endless substitutes. Another seller can cut the price, a nearby developer can offer a better payment plan, a newer project can throw in furniture. That makes price competition brutal.

A finished villa in a strong location, a genuinely unusual penthouse, an established beachfront home or a unit with something hard to reproduce faces much less competition. Finished property also removes risk: you can inspect the building, check the HOA, the noise, the access, the water and power, and see real rental results. Presale buyers have to guess all of that.

So the recovery will probably start unevenly. Scarce, finished, well-priced property should settle first. Generic condos sold on projected Airbnb returns will lag.

Could Tulum condo prices still fall another 10% or 20%?

Yes, for some oversupplied condos that's quite plausible, even if the market as a whole is late in its correction.

Rental income shows why. Take a condo sold for $200,000 on the promise of about $16,000 of net income a year, an 8% yield. If the real income after costs and tax is closer to $8,000, the yield at that price is 4%.

A buyer who wants 5% would value that $8,000 at about $160,000. At 6%, it's about $133,000. Real valuation is more complex (personal use, amenities, hopes of appreciation), but it shows how a condo can already be down 15% and still be expensive.

The risk is concentrated. A seller with no debt and a scarce property can wait. An owner paying HOA fees on a generic condo with mediocre bookings, in a season with fewer flights, may take whatever price brings cash. If there's a next leg down, it will be much more property-specific than the first.

What would convince us that Tulum real estate has finally bottomed?

Buyers absorbing inventory faster, tourism that stops weakening, and sellers no longer needing deeper discounts to close.

Only part of that is in place. The Airbnb cleanup is the strongest positive: active listings fell 73.1% in a year and survivors' occupancy improved. Sales are less convincing, with no sign yet of a turn from the 2025 level. Tourism is still going the wrong way, with hotel occupancy down and airlines leaving.

Three things would make us much more confident: sales stop falling for several periods, available finished stock clearly shrinks, and RevPAR improves without relying mainly on weak listings disappearing. Tulum is closer to passing those tests than before. It hasn't passed them yet, and the flight cuts push the test date back.

So, has Tulum real estate hit the bottom?

No. Tulum is probably in the later part of its correction, but calling a market-wide bottom today is premature.

Some ingredients of a late correction are here: sales already halved from 2023, an Airbnb market purging excess supply, buyers with far more negotiating power, and developers who can no longer count on generic condos selling just because they're in Tulum.

But the problems are big. Thousands of condos still compete for buyers, sales haven't rebounded, hotel occupancy is falling, airport traffic dropped by a third in the first half of 2026 and two Mexican airlines are pulling out. Short-term rental occupancy is better, but nightly rates are still under pressure.

The useful reading for a buyer: good individual purchases exist before the market has fully settled. Someone buying a finished, legally clean, hard-to-copy property from a motivated seller may already be paying near its long-term value. Someone paying a polished developer price for another interchangeable one-bedroom Airbnb condo is probably early, and weaker condos can still fall further.