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Showing activity spiked in November, report reveals

Credit: Paul Bradbury and Getty Images

Home showing activity in the U.S. jumped 12.6 percent year-over-year in November, according to a new report, suggesting the real estate market remained strong even through the normally slower fall months.

The report, from real estate data firm ShowingTime, reveals that the spike in showing activity in November was the largest since January 2017. November was also the fourth straight month that saw increased showing activity.

Those findings prompted ShowingTime Chief Analytics Officer Daniil Cherkasskiy to note that while the holidays generally are slow for real estate, “November 2019 was one of the busiest Novembers on record.”

Daniil Cherkasskiy

“While different markets saw varying levels of activity, several saw a substantial increase, as a greater number of buyers continued their search for a home than we typically see during the season,” Cherkasskiy explained in the report. “In addition, the lateness of Thanksgiving this year compared to last year’s early holiday pushed the year-over-year number of showings even higher in November.”

According to ShowingTime, the 11 states in the western U.S. saw the biggest November jump in showing activity, with a 23.1 percent increase year-over-year. The South saw a 15.4 percent year-over-year increase, followed by the Northeast at 13 percent and the Midwest at 7.1 percent.

Chicago-based ShowingTime first launched in 1999 and uses data to track and analyze home showings. The company also offers a number of data-based showing management tools and claims to serve more than 950,000 agents. ShowingTime also says that its products help manage more than 4 million showings each month.

While the firm’s latest report doesn’t track actual home closings, it supports other recent findings that indicate the market remained strong this fall. For example, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) reported last month that existing home sales rose 1.9 percent year-over-year in October.

Real estate data company CoreLogic also recently reported that delinquency rates are at a 20-year low.

Lawrence Yun

All of this is good news for real estate professionals trying to make it through the winter doldrums. Better still, NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun said last month that he expects the real estate market to remain strong going forward.

“Historically low interest rates, continuing job expansion, higher weekly earnings and low mortgage rates,” Yun said in a statement with NAR’s report, “are undoubtedly contributing to these higher numbers.”

Email Jim Dalrymple II

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