January Home Sales Up 5.6% from Year Ago

January usually is the slowest month of the year for home sales. “Improvement,” therefore, is relative. But for January 2017, improvement it was, according to the January sales report released Friday by the Greater Albuquerque Association of Realtors.
The sale of 662 single family detached homes closed during January. That was 35 more than January 2015 and a 5.6% improvement. In keeping with the seasonal trends, the January closed sales were 213 units or 24% less than December.
Pending sales went the other way with a 22% increase over December. It was 937 sales pending for January, up from 770 in December. The January pending performance beat January 2015 by 135 sales, or 16.8%. The heavy pending figure from January suggests robust closed sales for February.
Closing sales during January took longer by three days than during December. The 62 day average time on market was first month the average sales period was over 60 days since March 2016. The sales period has been as low as 49 days.
Pries were increased during January from a year ago but dropped from December. The $185,000 December median price beat January 2015 by 7.2%, or $12,500 but was $5,000 down from December. The average price, $218,488 in January, dropped almost $4,000 from December to the same level as November and October. The January 2015 average was 3.1% less than a year later.
The inventory of homes for sale, 2,889 during January, remains about 20% less than a year earlier.