The number of existing U.S. homes that are under contract climbed to the highest level in 10 months, and the Northeast led the gain.
As of March, the seasonally adjusted Pending Home Sales Index,
a barometer of residential contract signings, landed at 110.5.
Based on historical data, the last time that the index was this high was in May 2015, when it came in at a downwardly revised 111.0.
The latest data was released Wednesday by the National Association of Realtors.
Compared to February 2016’s downwardly revised index and March 2015’s upwardly revised index, pending home sales were up more than a percent.
Pending home sales have increased from a year earlier for 19 consecutive months.
“In the short-term, the healthy labor market and favorable borrowing costs should lead to sustained buyer demand and a durable pace of sales,” the report stated.
The biggest month-over-month gain — 3.2 percent — was in the Northeast, with that index coming it at 97.0.
A 3.0 percent increase from February left the South’s index at 125.4.
Pending home sales were up less than a percent in the Midwest, with the index there rising to 112.8.
Only the West saw a decline in pending home sales, with the index retreating 2 percent to 95.3.
“Demand is starting to weaken in some areas, particularly in the West, where the median home price has risen an astonishing 38 percent in the past three years,” NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun said in the report. “As a result, pending sales in the region have now declined in four of the last five months and are lower than one year ago for the third month in a row.”
Without any seasonal adjustments, U.S. pending home sales surged 30 percent from a month earlier and were up 3 percent from a year earlier.
Yun noted in the report that weak new construction of
single-family homes in recent years is limiting buyer choices and driving up prices beyond affordable levels.
But one good bit of news recently along those lines is that the
seasonally adjusted 246,000 new single-family homes for sale as of last month was the largest inventory of new homes since September 2009 based on data from the Census Bureau and Department of Housing and Urban Development.
