“For sale” and “waiting” panels in the West Seattle district in Seattle, Washington, United States, Tuesday, June 18, 2024. The National Association of Realtors should publish existing house sales figures on June 21.
David Ryder | Bloomberg | Getty images
High mortgage rate and high prices of combined houses to crush sales of houses in January.
Pending sales, which are based on contracts signed for existing houses, fell 4.6% from December to the lowest level since the National Association of Realtors began to follow this metric in 2001. Sales fell by 5.2% compared to January 2024. These sales are an indicator of future closures.
“We do not know if the coldest in January 25 has contributed to fewer buyers on the market, and if this is the case, expect more sales activity in the coming months,” said Lawrence Yun, chief economist of NAR. “However, it is obvious that the high prices of houses and higher mortgage rates have set out to affordability.”
Although the time could have been a factor, sales increased from month to northeast and dropped to the west, which would have experienced the smallest impact of cold temperatures. Sales have dropped in the south, which has been the most active region for sales of houses in recent years.
Mortgage rates were also higher in January. The average rate on the 30 -year -old popular fixed loan passed the first half of less than 7%, but then started to increase. It was solidly greater than 7% for the whole month of January, according to MortGage News.
The prices of houses have softened in recent months in certain areas, with more sellers reducing prices, but at the national level, they are always higher than they were a year ago.
This drop in sales also occurred despite the fact that the inventory of houses for sales in January, including the houses under contract but which are not yet sold, increased by 17% compared to last year, increasing on an annual basis for the 14th consecutive month, according to Realtor.com.
“An inventory more for sale has the potential to generate more contract signatures, but the climbing of home supply is also not distributed in the United States,” noted Hannah Jones, economist at Realtor.com. “In addition, many fields with high demand see an inventory with relatively low sale, which limits progress towards more sales of houses.”