Fewer Toledo-area home sales in ‘distress’
Total property purchase price up 25%
6/24/2014“Distressed” home sales are playing less of a factor in the Toledo-area housing market, according to data released today by RealtyTrac.
Distress sales include short sales, bank-owned sales, and foreclosure auctions.
According to the California firm, 22.7 percent of local sales in May were distressed sales, down from 26.7 percent a year earlier.
More than two thirds of those were bank-owned sales, also known as real estate-owned sales. Those are properties repossessed by a lender.
In the Toledo area, the median price of distressed properties in May was $40,200, up from $35,167 in May, 2013. The median price of nondistressed properties was $93,000, up from $88,000 a year earlier.
The median price of all sales was $85,000, up 25 percent from $68,200 a year ago.
“Distressed sales continue to represent a smaller share of the overall sales pie nationwide, helping to boost median home prices higher given that distressed sales tend to be in lower price ranges,” said Daren Blomquist, vice president at RealtyTrac.
Meanwhile, the National Association of Realtors said Monday that sales of previously owned homes jumped 4.9 percent from April to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.89 million in May. It was the largest increase since August, 2011, and beat expectations.
Analysts had forecast sales to reach about an adjusted rate of 4.75 million last month.
The positive report comes as the housing recovery has faltered. The market slowed toward the end of last year after prices surged and mortgage rates rose. High costs in some parts of the country have deterred potential buyers and held May sales 5 percent below the same month a year earlier.
But there are signs buyers are returning. The sales increase from April marked the second consecutive monthly gain, and April’s figures were revised upward.
Buyers are coming off the fence for several reasons, the Realtors group said: Mortgage rates have stabilized at a historically low level, and owners are increasingly listing their homes for sale. That’s giving buyers more options and tempering price growth.
“The temporary pause in rising interest rates and more homes for sale is good news — especially for first-time home buyers,” the group’s president, Steve Brown, said in a statement.
The median home price reached $213,400 in May, 5.1 percent higher than a year earlier.
As previously reported, the Toledo Board of Realtors said that northwest Ohio home sales in May were up 7 percent from a year earlier. The median price was up 2 percent to $95,500.
The board’s report includes only houses sold by a Realtor.