More on the Fall of Existing Florida Home Sales
With the lone exception of Sarasota, existing home sales fell for the 17th consecutive month in April.
Statewide, sales fell 26 percent, to 12,016 homes, while in the Tampa Bay housing market, existing home sales decreased by 35 percent, to 2,257 sales. Just two years ago, 5,105 homes were sold in April in the Tampa Bay area.
Median prices, while still declining, are not falling at the same rate as home sales. The median price for the state dropped 3 percent to $237,000, while in Tampa Bay, it fell 5 percent to $209,700. While that is down from a year ago, it is still up 14.5 percent from April 2005.
In Sarasota, existing homes sales rose 16 percent to 796, but median prices declined 2 percent to $294,800. That’s still not enough to force the buying hand of numerous hopeful Florida mortgage borrowers.
Florida housing industry analysts anticipate that a decline in subprime mortgage loans, coupled with stricter lending standards, could impact housing activity in the coming months. One benefit for the market is the disappearance of speculative behavior, which contributed to abnormal price growth, said National Association of Realtors Senior Economist Lawrence Yun in a release:
“Home buyers today are purchasing for the long-term, generally with a realistic expectation of modest gains over time,” Yun said. “It’s good that we’re getting beyond the tendency of some buyers to view housing as a temporary asset to accumulate short-term wealth, which is not to be expected in a normal market.”
Existing home sales will increase gradually in the second half of 2007, with prices recovering a bit later, NAR predicts.
Sales of existing condominiums in Florida also decreased last month, with a total of 4,321 condos sold statewide compared to 5,344 in April 2006 for a 19 percent decline, according to FAR. The statewide median sales price for condos last month was $215,500, up 3 percent from April 2006’s condo median price of $210,000.
In Tampa Bay, sales fell 39 percent, to 549, while prices dropped 2 percent, to $170,400. It could be a long summer as developers await Florida mortgage loan activity to pick back up.
