Home sales, prices stayed hot in January
Home sales usually slow down in the winter, but San Antonio’s housing market showed no signs of cooling last month as the coronavirus pandemic continues upending seasonal patterns.
As buyers in Bexar and surrounding counties seized on low mortgage rates and grappled with a tight supply of houses, sales and prices broke records in January, according to the San Antonio Board of Realtors (SABOR).
Sales rose 22.4 percent compared with the same month last year. Over 68 percent of the 2,559 homes sold were priced between $200,000 and $499,999 and 22.7 percent were priced under $199,999. Nearly 9 percent were priced over $500,000.
The median price in January jumped 13.7 percent to $259,200.
“The demand for housing typically experiences a slower start at the beginning of
each year, but in seeing a consistent and quick rise in home sales, we expect a bright 2021,” said SABOR board chairman Cher Miculka.
Inventory — measured by how long it takes for a home to be sold if no new homes are listed — dropped to 1.5 months in January, down from 3.3 months during the same stretch last year. Six months is generally considered a balance between buyers and sellers.
Another sign that it’s a sellers market: 98 percent of homes sold for the list price in January, compared with 97.4 percent a year earlier.
Houses spent an average of 46 days on the market last month, a decrease from 65 days a year earlier.
The local housing market is coming off of a recordbreaking year, with sales rising 11.2 percent and the median price jumping 7 percent compared with 2019.
Sales slowed last spring amid lock-down orders, bumping purchases to later in the year, and buyers sought to take advantage of low mortgage rates and to spread out in more space.
In January, nationwide sales of existing homes rose 23.7 percent and the median price jumped 14.1 percent to $303,900 from a year earlier, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR).
Amid tight inventory, 71 percent of the homes sold last month were on the market for less than a month.
“Home sales continue to ascend in the first month of the year, as buyers quickly snatched up virtually every new listing coming on the market,” said Lawrence Yun, NAR’S chief economist. “Sales easily could have been even 20 percent higher if there had been more in- ventory and more choices.”