Home Sales Continue Improvement in February

The Nashville-area real estate market has now strung together five months of increased sales. Closings in February were up more than 3%.

Five months of gains is starting to look like a stabilizing trend to the Greater Nashville Association of Realtors. Home prices aren’t following the upward swing, but GNAR President Lucy Smith says the median sales price hasn’t declined either.

“It’s fluctuated a little bit. It was$160,000 a year ago and its $159,900 now. $100, I don’t think is anything to have a huge conversation over.”

Compared to single family homes, condo prices haven’t held quite as steady, falling below $150,000 in February. The median price for condo sales was briefly higher than single family homes.

The median sales price of a single family home has held relatively steady, but it’s down from a high of $196,000 in June of 2007.

Smith says the median price partly reflects a stagnant market for high end homes.

“With people wanting to make sure they can sell their house first and that they’re going to get a good price for their house and not pay too much for something on the upper end.”

At the present rate of 1,300 closings per month, it would still take nearly a year and a half to sell all of the houses on the market right now. The amount of inventory hasn’t improved over the last year.

Nearly twice the number of lots and farmland changed hands last month as compared to the same period last year. It may be a sign developers are considering new home construction, but the gains represent just 61 closings – a mere one percent of the 6,000 vacant lots for sale right now.

Nashville area realtors anticipate a continued increase of sales activity in the coming months as federal home buyer tax credits start to expire.