U.S. home sales in August extended a summer of strong demand and weak inventory that once again resulted in listings with short shelf lives. In addition to the normal late summer real estate trends, a primary focus during the next month will be on housing in specific markets affected by natural disasters like devastating wildfires and hurricanes Harvey and Irma.
The RE/MAX National Housing Report shows August sales topping July by 2.8%, but finishing 0.84% below August 2016 which remains the best August in the report’s 9-year history. Houston, where Hurricane Harvey made landfall on August 25, already experienced a 21.3% drop in sales from July and a 27.5% decline year-over-year.
Inventory in the report’s 54 markets declined 3.9% from July and 13.7% from a year ago, driving Days on Market to drop to 47 – the fastest listing-to-sale average for any August. The Months Supply of Inventory, while continuing to rebound from a May low of 2.6, settled at 3.1 months and set another report record for August.
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