Friday, May 23, 2008

Housing Market Correction: It's Far From Over

WASHINGTON -- Existing-home sales fell a second month in a row during April, while inventories surged and prices dropped sharply from a year earlier.

Home resales fell to a 4.89 million annual rate, a 1.0% decrease from March's revised 4.94 million annual pace, the National Association of Realtors said Friday. Originally, the NAR estimated sales fell 2.0% to 4.93 million in March.

The median home price was $202,300 in April, down 8.0% from $219,900 in April 2007. The median price in March this year was $200,100. High inventories have exerted downward pressure on prices. The decline has kept would-be buyers from signing off on property as they wait for still-lower price tags.

Inventories of homes increased 10.5% at the end of April to 4.55 million available for sale, which represented an 11.2-month supply at the current sales pace (the highest level since 1982 (updated), see chart above, data available here). There was a 10.0-month supply at the end of March, revised from a previously estimated 9.9 months.

5 Comments:

At 5/23/2008 1:57 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

the highest level [of inventory] in at least 4 years, see chart above.

Your data set is incorrect. This is the highest level of months supply since the 1982 double dip recession.

When the housing market correction is all said and done you can compare peak months supply to the 1930's. Of course, there is no data available from that goldilocks era.

 
At 5/23/2008 2:13 PM, Blogger Mark J. Perry said...

Corrected and updated. Thanks.

 
At 5/23/2008 5:15 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Lemmings!

Since when is there a national real estate market?

 
At 5/23/2008 9:31 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

1776

 
At 5/26/2008 11:32 AM, Blogger OBloodyHell said...

> Lemmings!
> Since when is there a national real estate market?

> 1776

Well, that said, there is a certain limit to the apples-and-oranges comparison of a house unsold in Poughkeepsie and a house unsold in Miami, FL.

I think the real issue lies in a breakdown of where they are, as much as the total numbers.

Likely there are places where the backlog is greater than "normal", and others where it's less.

 

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