Tuesday, April 23, 2013

New Home Sales: March 2013

Yesterday, the U.S. Census Department released its monthly New Residential Home Sales Report for March showing a improvement with sales climbing 1.5% from February and rising 18.5% above the level seen in March 2012 but still remaining at an historically low level of 417K SAAR units.

It's important to recognize that the inventory of new homes appears to be mounting as unsold units totaled 153K, still though near the lowest level seen in in at least 47 years while the median number of months for sale went flat at 5.0.

The monthly supply went flat at 4.4 months while the median selling price increased 3.0% and the average selling price declined 1.3% from the year ago level.

The following chart show the extent of sales decline to date (click for full-larger version).