Home prices

A summer resurgence of home buying stretched into August, defying the pandemic to set record home prices and drive sales to a near two-year high, new housing figures show.

Chattanooga, Tenn., home sales continued last month to rebound from the coronavirus-spurred slump in the spring, boosting the median price of homes sold during August to an all-time high.

Sales of new homes climbed in Houston and other large Texas markets in August, with September shaping up to be another strong month for sales for the homebuilding industry.

Outside the densely populated coastal hubs, annual home sales grew by leaps and bounds, as buying patterns shifted toward more space with less emphasis on proximity to urban centers, according to Redfin.

Sales of previously owned homes remained brisk in August as low mortgage rates and demand for space in the suburbs sustained strength in a housing market that’s a bright spot for the economy.

The song remains the same: There still aren't enough houses to keep up with all the people trying to buy them in Missoula, Mont., so that means prices keep shooting up.

More defaults will lead to an increase in distressed sales, and that will drive down prices, CoreLogic said.

A boom in the U.K. housing market gathered pace this month as Britons' pandemic-driven desire for more living space and a tax break on purchases pushed asking prices up by the most in four years.

Canadian new home prices recorded their sharpest one-month gain in three years with higher demand and rising costs for building materials.

August was a blockbuster month for home sellers across the 16-county metro, despite the global pandemic and a coming presidential election, which typically puts buyers on edge.

Marin County, Calif., home sales jumped by 46% in August over the prior year, marking the third straight month of gains after the rocky pandemic spring.

As the summer home-selling season came to a close, median sale prices — both across Central Texas and within the Austin city limits — reached all-time highs in August, the Austin Board of Realtors said.

The median sales price for a single-family house in Rhode Island hit an all-time high of $333,164 in August, according to the Rhode Island Association of Realtors.

Nowhere is the widening gap between real estate and the real economy more apparent than in Las Vegas, where tourism is in ruins, wages are plunging and home prices just keep rocketing higher.

The median housing prices in Merced County, Calif., have increased in each of the last five months.

The number of homes sold in metro Baton Rouge, La., was 11.2% higher in August than the year before, continuing a hot streak triggered by low interest rates.

The North Texas housing market continued to thumb its nose at the pandemic in August, with home sales up 11% from a year ago.

The Harrisburg, Pa., area real estate market has come a long way since it was shut down completely by Gov. Tom Wolf due to COVID-19 back in March and reopened slowly in April and May.

Listing prices in California have risen 34% since January as inventory shriveled amid the pandemic.

Median closing prices hit a new record high during the four-week period ended Sept. 6, Redfin said.