Last month’s predictions that home sales would be stronger than previously anticipated came to fruition, with sales increasing 7.5 percent year-over-year in November, according to the most recent Real Trends Housing Market Report.
That year-over-year gain is the strongest annual showing since June of this year, the real estate data provider said.
However, the month-over-month results were more disappointing. Real Trends reported that the annualized rate of new and existing home sales in November was 5.721 million, which was up from November 2014’s rate of 5.245 million, but down significantly from the 6.366 million rate in October 2015.
Meanwhile, the average price of homes sold showed only a slight increase of 0.5 percent from November 2014, which is among the lowest year-over-year increase in prices nationally since last year, Real Trends said.
“Last month’s pending homes sales report indicated that sales would be stronger than had been previously expected, and that is what has happened,” said Steve Murray, editor of the Real Trends Housing Market Report.
“It is important to note however, that month-over-month changes in unit sales and average prices are still below their recent highs, and nothing we have seen changes most forecaster’s views that 2016 will see moderate increases in unit sales and prices. We expect that housing unit sales increases will continue to slide on a year-over-year basis, and that prices will continue their recent trend of moderate increases.”
Diving into specific geographic regions, Real Trends said the West and South showed the weakest results in unit sales, while the Northeast, which has lagged behind the rest of the country for the past four years in unit sales increases, made a comeback to lead the nation.
Specifically, the regional breakdown for unit sales increases was as follows:
- West, 4.2 percent
- South, 4.4 percent
- Midwest, 9.9 percent
- Northeast, 16.3 percent
However, average prices in the Northeast declined 0.3 percent, and the West experienced a 2-percent price decline. The South and Midwest saw modest increases of 3.5 percent and 1.9 percent, respectively, according to the report.
