Home sales figures released against a backdrop of rising inventory
Home sales figures released against a backdrop of rising inventory
Spring and summer is typically the high season for home buying and selling, but sales have been pretty sluggish this year.
We’ll get fresh data later this morning on how many newly built homes sold last month. On Tuesday, the National Association of Realtors reported that sales of existing homes fell 5.4% in June to their lowest level since December. And the median price rose to a new all-time high of almost $427,000.
One small slice of good news, however, is that inventory is also rising.
2023 was a year of high mortgage rates and record low inventory. 2024 has been much of the same. But things are starting to shift, according to Danielle Hale, chief economist at Realtor.com.
“There is an improvement in sellers deciding, ‘OK now is the time. I’m going to list my home for sale,'” she said.
What’s behind that improvement? Partly, time. “I think the more time goes by, the more homeowners and sellers acclimate to the current rate environment,” she said.
When mortgage rates spiked, a lot of homeowners put off selling, noted Ali Wolf, chief economist at Zonda.
But now, it’s been a couple of years. “And if someone’s retiring, if someone’s having a second child, if someone’s getting married, they may need to sell their home even if they’re reluctant to reset their 3% interest rate,” she said.
Even though inventory is higher than it was last year, “it is extremely low across the country, relative to what we would consider normal,” Wolf said.
Most markets, she added, still feel very tight.
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