The median home sale price hit an all-time high this week while available inventory tanked to an all-time low during the four-week period ending December 19, according to new data released Wednesday.
Building on an historic rise in home sales prices tallied just one week ago, the median home sale price shot up 15 percent year over year to a record high of $360,500, Redfin reported. Active listings dropped 26 percent year over year to a new low of 526,833, which was also down 45 percent from 2019 levels.
The Redfin report, however, painted a bleak picture for buyers already fatigued by a challenging market.
“As the number of homes for sale drops to a new all-time low every week, homebuyers have a sense that the well is running dry,” Redfin Chief Economist Daryl Fairweather said in a statement. “Fewer homes are selling because of a lack of supply, while demand remains strong. That’s why home prices continue to climb higher and higher. But once mortgage rates increase in 2022, I expect the rate of price growth to slow down significantly.”
The median asking price for new listings revved up 14 percent year over year to $347,475, which was also up 29 percent from 2019.
Pending home sales rose modestly, by 0.1 percent year over year, as buyers battled with low inventory. Pending sales were also up 46 percent from 2019.
Meanwhile, new listings were down 9 percent from the previous year but up 11 percent from 2019.
Homes that went under contract and had an offer accepted within the first two weeks of being listed made up 42 percent of home sales, up from 36 percent the year before and 25 percent in 2019. Nearly one-third of homes that went under contract had an offer accepted within just one week of being listed, up from 26 percent the year before and up from 16 percent in 2019.
Houses spent a median of 26 days on market, down from 32 days the year before and 48 days in 2019.
Buyers came to expect the reality of having to pay above asking, with 43 percent of homes selling above list price, up from 34 percent the previous year and up from 20 percent in 2019. The average sale-to-list price ratio was 100.4 percent, meaning the typical home sold 0.4 percent above asking price.
An average of just 3 percent of homes on the market each week saw a price drop, up 0.5 percentage points from 2020 and up 0.3 percentage points from 2019.
On the mortgage side, mortgage purchase applications dropped 3 percent week over week during the week ending December 17 as 30-year mortgage rates climbed to 3.12 percent during the week ending December 16.
According to the Redfin Homebuyer Demand Index, which measures requests for home tours and homebuying services from Redfin agents, buyer demand declined 4 percent during the week ending December 19, which was up 14 percent year over year.
