May and June 2019 Were Exceptionally Strong, Despite Slow Start The Beginning of the Year!
The months of May and June 2019 were both exceptionally strong, especially considering the market was looking wobbly back in January.
Let us start with the basics - the ARMLS numbers for July 1, 2019 compared with July 1, 2018 for all areas & types:
Active Listings (excluding UCB & CCBS): 15,442 versus 16,101 last year - down 4.1% - and down 8.5% from 16,869 last month
Active Listings (including UCB & CCBS): 20,030 versus 20,464 last year - down 2.1% - and down 8.1% compared with 21,799 last month
Pending Listings: 6,642 versus 6,092 last year - up 9.0% - but down 5.3% from 7,015 last month
Under Contract Listings (including Pending, CCBS & UCB): 11,230 versus 10,455 last year - up 7.4% - but down 6.0% from 11,945 last month
Monthly Sales: 9,463 versus 9,234 last year - up 2.5% - but down 10.1% from 10,528 last month
Monthly Average Sales Price per Sq. Ft.: $172.30 versus $163.43 last year - up 5.4% - but up 0.2% from $172.01 last month
Monthly Median Sales Price: $279,000 versus $268,000 last year - up 4.1% - and up 0.4% from $278,000 last month
The most unusual change during June was the 8.5% drop in active listings (excluding UCB & CCBS), which lurched from 5.3% higher than 2018 on June 1 to 4.1% below 2018 on July 1. Much of this decline was due to the low number of listings activated during June - 8,731 is our current count, the second lowest number for June since 2001 and down 11% from June 2018. On top of a very busy month for contracts and closings this has caused the supply to tighten dramatically.
9,463 closed listings is a huge number for June. This is because June 2019 had only 20 working days, so the number of closings per day was over 473. June 2018 had 21 days so less than 440 closings per day. The difference is almost 8%.
Dollar volume for June was $3.315 billion. This is the highest total for any June in history.
The monthly median sales price of $279,000 is a new record high. The annual median sales price is also at a new record high at $268,000.
Average price per sq. ft. is nowhere near setting a new record, because the homes being sold today are much larger than those being sold at the last peak. The monthly average $/SF record is $190.05 set in May 2006. We edged up very slightly to $172.30 from $172.01 during June.
We now wait to see if July will continue the strong trends of May and June or start to ease off.
