Existing Home Sales Decline

By:
Kara Johnson | November 23, 2010

Existing home sales posted a small decline in October, following two consecutive months of substantial gains, according today’s monthly report from the National Association of Realtors. 

Sales of pre-owned single-family homes, condominiums and townhouses fell 2.2 percent for the month, to a seasonally adjusted annual sales rate of 4.43 million units. The downturn follows gains of 7.6 percent and 10 percent in August and September, respectively.
 
 “The housing market is experiencing an uneven recovery, and a temporary foreclosure stoppage in some states is likely to have held back a number of completed sales,” said Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist. “Still, sales activity is clearly off the bottom and is attempting to settle into normal sustainable levels.”
 
Yun said that based on current economic trends, existing home sales should gradually improve to an annual rate in excess of 5 million units by next spring.
 
The October figures represent a 25.9 percent decline from the annual rate of 5.98 million posted in October 2009. However, that figure was boosted by the approaching original deadline for the homebuyer tax credit. In absolute numbers, there have been 4.149 million existing home sales through the first 10 months of the year, down 2.9 percent from 4.272 million sold by the same point last year.
 
The national median sales price for all homes in October was $170,500, down 0.9 percent from Oct. 2009. Just over one-third of all home sales were foreclosures or other distressed sales, down slightly from September.

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