Prices Increase 5.8 Percent Nationally From Last Year
SEATTLE — Sept. 18, 2015 — August home sales fell 11.8 percent from July as 10.8 percent fewer homes were listed for sale, according to Redfin (www.redfin.com), the next-generation real estate brokerage. The national median sale price fell slightly month over month to $275,200 in August. The overall number of homes for sale remained at about the same level, increasing by 0.2 percentage points.
Year over year, the median sale price was up 5.8 percent. Nationally, prices have seen year over year gains every month since December 2011. Home sales were 6.5 percent higher than they were in August of 2014, continuing a trend of 2015 sales outpacing 2014 sales every month this year. New home listings were up 6.7 percent nationally and increased slightly more than sales for the second consecutive month.
Based on the current pace of home sales and inventory, the overall supply of homes increased to 3.2 months in August, up from the record low of 2.8 seen in June and July. Six months of supply is generally considered a well-balanced market, with less than 6 months of supply favoring sellers.
This month’s data points to the the start of the seasonal housing market slowdown, as our Demand Index predicted last month, and a small amount of relief for homebuyers.
Local Market Insights in August
- The median sale price in Fort Lauderdale increased by 25.2 percent year over year to $219,000, while North Port, FL, increased 21.6 percent to $237,000, the highest increases nationwide. A big part of that increase was due to sales growth in single-family residences outpacing that of multifamily dwellings.
- Nashville and Richmond, VA, strongly outpaced national sales growth with 29.2 percent and 22.5 percent more homes sold than last last year.
- Sales continued to decline in San Francisco, where only 1,197 homes sold, down 13.2 percent from July and 14.9 percent from August 2014.
- Denver was the fastest market in August with half of all homes selling in seven days or less, followed by Omaha, Portland and Seattle (12 days). Two-thirds of Denver listings sold in less than two weeks.
- Supply remained extremely low in Oakland (1.3 months of supply), Seattle (1.5 months), San Francisco (1.7 months), Denver (1.7 months), San Jose (1.9 months) and Portland (1.9 months).
Redfin also took an in-depth look at home prices, inventory and sales across neighborhoods for four cities: Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. To read the full reports, complete with data, charts and insights from Redfin agents, please visit the following link: https://www.redfin.com/research/reports/real-time-housing-market-tracker/2015/market-tracker-august-2015.html.
About Redfin
Redfin (www.redfin.com) is a next-generation real estate brokerage that represents people buying and selling homes. Founded by technologists, Redfin employs a team of experienced, full-service real estate agents who are advocates, not salespeople, earning customer-satisfaction bonuses, not just commissions. Redfin.com features all the broker-listed homes for sale, as well as for-sale-by-owner properties that don’t pay brokers a commission. Redfin also offers online tools, built by its own software engineers, that make the entire process of buying or selling a home easier and more fun. The company serves major markets across the U.S. and has closed nearly $20 billion in home sales. In 2012, Redfin was named one of The DIGITAL 100: World’s Most Valuable Private Tech Companies by Business Insider.
