July was a good month for new home sales, which saw an increase of 9.6 percent during the month.Before we look at the good news, let's cover the bad news first. Even with the jump in sales in July, new home sales are still well below their peak four years ago. In fact, new home sales are 69 percent below their peaks when the housing market was at its best.
Still, there is reason to believe that the housing market is rebounding. July's sales figures mark a 32 percent increase from their lows in January.
According to the Commerce Department, new home sales rose to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 433,000 in July. This was up from 395,000 in June.
Last month's pace was the strongest that the market has seen last September, and well above analyst estimates. Before today's report, analysts had been expecting to see an annual rate of just 390,000 new home sales.
Home prices are still pretty depressed. The average median price for new homes sold in July was $210,000. This is 11.5 percent below the average price for the same period last year.
Home inventories are still a big problem, but July's sales did have a 3% effect on homes for sale, which at the end of the month was sitting at 271,000. This represents 7.5 months worth of supply. This is the lowest inventory level since April 2007.
What are your thoughts on the housing market? Have we seen the bottom, or are there more hard times ahead?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
8-26-2009 @ 6:17PM
ij70 said...
Knock, knock. July ended 26 days ago.
Do you realize that with C4C, the new home sales numbers for August 2009 are going to be down, again?