Tallahassee Real Estate Blog

Existing-home sales got back on an upward path in November, resuming a growth trend since bottoming in July, according to the National Association of REALTORS^®.

Existing-home sales, which are completed transactions that include single-family, townhomes, condominiums, and co-ops, rose 5.6 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.68 million in November from 4.43 million in October, but are 27.9 percent below the cyclical peak of 6.49 million in November 2009, which was the initial deadline for the first-time buyer tax credit.

Lawrence Yun NAR chief economist, is hopeful for 2011. “Continuing gains in home sales are encouraging, and the positive impact of steady job creation will more than trump some negative impact from a modest rise in mortgage interest rates, which remain historically favorable,” he said.

Yun added that home buyers are responding to improved affordability conditions. “The relationship recently between mortgage interest rates, home prices and family income has been the most favorable on record for buying a home since we started measuring in 1970,” he said. “Therefore, the market is recovering, and we should trend up to a healthy, sustainable level in 2011.”

 In the South, existing-home sales rose 2.9 percent to an annual pace of 1.76 million in November but are 26.1 percent below the tax credit surge in November 2009. The median price in the South was $148,000, down 2.6 percent from a year ago.

This news also comes with some bad news.A Standard & Poors/Experian Consumer Credit Default report for December released Tuesday show an increase in monthly mortgage default rates for the first time since December 2009, although the year-over-year decline is 38.84 percent.

Of the five major metropolitan areas tracked in the report, only Dallas had a declining default rate of 2.20 percent. Los Angeles and Chicago defaults were up 3.25 percent and 3.34 percent, respectively. Miami had the largest default rate at 10.26 percent.

The deterioration in the mortgage sector may be temporary as rates of new defaults have been declining for over a year with occasional brief interruptions, says David Blitzer, Experian managing director.

Source: S&P/Experian (12/20/2010)

 All of this information can be found at the following links