Area home sales keep up last year’s pace

Residential home sales in the Boulder Valley and Northern Colorado continue to keep pace with last year’s record-breaking performance. For the year to date, sales are virtually even, the median price is up 4.3 percent to $260,700 and the total volume is now at $3.57 billion.

Weld County is the only area with an increase in sales, and all areas show a price increase for the year to date, ranging from 13.1 percent in Broomfield County to 6.0 percent in Boulder County.

With 60 percent of the year in the books, we are on a pace for about 18,500 home sales compared with 18,689 last year. The median price should be in the range of $261,500, which would be a 5 percent increase over last year. The total volume is expected to break $6 billion for the first time.

Sales in July actually showed a small increase, from 2,105 last year to 2,110 this year, and the median price was up 5.5 percent to $269,000.

Just four years ago, in 2009, sales bottomed out at 13,647 and the median price dropped to $210,400. The total market volume in these two years averaged $3.65 billion, so the figures for 2013 and 2014 are a decided recovery.

The good news is that the inventory of homes for sale is starting to increase. There are currently 6,510 active listings compared with 4,016 a month ago and 3,744 at the end of May. With an expected demand for 7,500 homes in the last five months of this year, there is now a 4.3-month supply, compared with a two- or three-month supply for the first half of the year. This extra supply should help to moderate the price increase and, coupled with mortgage rates that are staying in the 4 percent range, it is about as good as it is going to get for home buyers.

The National Association of Realtors just released the second-quarter report on the national median home pricing, and the 4.4-percent increase from a year earlier is the smallest annual gain in two years. This prompted Lawrence Yun, chief economist for NAR, to say, “The market is moving from being somewhat heated to a balanced market. We are returning to more moderate middle ground.”

Dave Pettigrew can be contacted at FCRealtor@msn.com or 970-282-9305.

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