The new year started off with a bang in the Houston metropolitan area, where home sales were up for the eighth consecutive month in January.
The Houston Association of Realtors also reports that the year opened with a continued decline in active property listings and growth in pending sales, a healthy combination that signals a return to a balanced market. That puts the big Texas market on enviable footing compared to many other markets that are slowly recovering from the housing downturn.
Sales of existing single-family houses climbed 9.2% in January from a year ago. All price sectors -- with the exception of luxury homes priced over half-a-million dollars -- were up, HAR says.
The latest figures “give us cause for optimism as we look ahead to the typically active Spring and Summer buying months,” said association chairman Wayne A. Stroman and CEO of Stroman Realty. “We have also seen more jobs being filled locally and you generally don't experience a strong real estate market without healthy employment.”
Foreclosure sales reported in the local multiple listing service increased 22% year-over-year in January and accounted for more than one in four deals in the month. Month-end pending sales for January totaled 3,164, an increase of 6% from last year, suggesting another positive month of sales when the figures for February figures are counted.
The number of available properties, or active listings, at the end of January declined 15.1% from January 2011 to 42,067. And the inventory of single-family homes dropped to its lowest level since December 2009, 5.7 months at the current sales pace as compared to 7.2 months a year earlier.
