February Existing Homes Sales Prices Decline

FEBRUARY EXISTING HOME SALES, PRICES DECLINE

 TEXAS (March 31, 2009 RECON Real Estate Center, Reuters, CNN Money) – A total of 13,312 existing homes were sold in Texas last month, a 25.4 percent decline from February 2008, according to MLS data compiled by the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. The median price dropped 2.9 percent to $138,300 during the same period, and the state finished the month with a 6.7-month inventory of existing homes.

Here is how select Texas cities fared in February (data current as of March 31, 2009):

 Additional home sales data for these and other major Texas cities are available on the Center’s website.

Nationally, sales of existing single-family homes last month were down 4.6 percent compared with February 2008, according to the National Association of Realtors. Sales were at a 4.72 million annual rate. At $165,400, the median sales price was down 15.5 percent from a year earlier. Inventory was at 9.7 months.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that new home sales rose 4.7 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 337,000 in February from a revised 322,000 in January. While February purchases were up from January's record low, the sales rate was still down more than 41 percent from February 2008, when sales were an estimated 572,000. The report also showed that the median sales price of new houses sold in February was $200,900, down 18 percent from $245,300 a year ago.