In a report released by the NAR, a decline in existing homes was reported. This decline in sales of existing homes fell by 1.7%. This down turn is in comparison to the previous month of August to the month of September.
Many realtors attribute this decline in existing home sales to the fact that there is a shrinking inventory of existing homes that are for sale. Specifically, it is estimated that the supply of existing homes available for sale is at a 5.9 month supply level. This anticipated supply of homes available over the next six months is a decline of 20% over year-to-year comparison
In comparison of year 2012 to 2011, existing home sales have increased at a level of 11 percent.
Currently, the average home price is at a level of $183,900. This median home price is an increase of 11.3% over year to date. Additionally, reflecting an encouraging turnaround in the economic market, this increase in median price is the seventh such increase consecutively for the median value of American homes. This increase has not been experienced since the 2005/2006 housing bubble.
For the month of September, 24% of the homes sold were offered to buyers at significant discounts. Reflected in this 24% of extremely discounted homes are foreclosures at a level of 13% and short sales at a level of 11%. These particularly labeled existing home sales reflected a 22% increase over the month of August in calendar year 2012. Those homes that were foreclosed on sold at a 21% discount below the median cost in short sales and were purchased at a 13% discount under the median cost.
Also, statistics reflect that those existing homes that were sold were only advertised on the market for 30 days or less. In addition to the rapid sales of existing homes is the further statistic reflecting that cash sales of homes were at a high level. Further statistic breakdown shows that purchases of existing homes were bought by first-time homeowners at a level of 32%. This 32% for the month of September is in comparison to a level of 31% for the month of August.
In comparison to previous year over current year, the use of cash for home purchases was at a level of 30% in September in 2011 as compared to the use of cash level of 27% for the month of August, 2011.
Rounding out the existing home sales for the month of September, were the foreclosure statistics as reported by Realtytrac. In that report a total of 180,427 properties in America for the month of September were tagged as having some sort of foreclosing action taken. Those actions included scheduled auctions, default notices and repossessions by banking institutions. This number of foreclosures is a 7% decrease from the month of August and is at a 16% decrease from September of 2011.
The foreclosure filings for the month of September of 2012 are at the lowest number since the year 2000 for the month of July.
