Lawler: Early Read on Existing Home Sales in December

From housing economist Tom Lawler: Early Read on Existing Home Sales in December

Based on publicly-available local realtor/MLS reports from across the country released through this morning, I project that existing home sales as estimated by the National Association of Realtors ran at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.55 million, down 1.1% from November’s preliminary pace and up 1.8% from last November’s seasonally-adjusted pace. On the inventory front, local realtor/MLS reports suggest that existing home inventories declined by almost as much last month as they did last December (which was a much larger drop than the seasonal norm), and I project that the NAR inventory number for December will be 1.61 million, down 13.0% from November and down 8.5% from last November. Finally, local realtor/MLS data suggest that the NAR’s median existing SF home sales price for December will be up 6.7% from last December.

CR Note: The NAR is scheduled to release December existing home sales on Tuesday, January 24th.