Home Sales Increase in West

The western U.S. region, including Colorado, was the only area of the country to have an increase in sales of existing homes — nearly 18 percent — from November 2007 to the same month this year, according to data released by the National Association of Realtors on Tuesday.

Median selling price of homes in the West, though, had the biggest regional decrease — nearly 26 percent — supporting Colorado real estate experts’ contention that homes in the state finally are priced to sell.

Nationwide existing-home sales, or those of homes that have been sold at least once before, fell 10.6 percent last month to 4.49 million units from 5.02 million in November 2007. Sales were down 8.6 percent from 4.91 million units in October of this year.

Home sales traditionally drop in the fall and winter months, but pick back up in spring and summer.

Median selling price for homes nationwide decreased 13.2 percent to $181,300 in November from $208,800 for the same month of 2007. Median is the middle price between the highest and lowest selling prices, and is considered a truer price than average because it’s not skewed by the highest and lowest prices.

Types of homes in the NAR study included single-family homes, condominiums, townhomes and co-ops.

By comparison, existing home sales in the West increased 17.9 percent to 1.12 million in November year over year. Sales decreased only 4.3 percent from October of this year.

The median selling price of a home in the West dropped 25.5 percent to $242,500 from the same month last year.

NAR would like to see the federal government help stimulate homebuying by offering first-time buyers tax credits and making the higher loan limits vital in high-cost markets permanent. The trade group also would like to see Congress and the Obama administration help make short sales easier and “unclog the mortgage pipeline.”

“It is imperative to provide incentives for homebuyers to get back into the market,” Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief economist, said in a statement.

Yun also said NAR hopes the impact on home sales from the stock market crash will be short-lived, as in 1987 and 2001.

Denver Business Journal 12/23/08