October Market Statistics

The trend we have been seeing for months continues once again. Prices are yet again up while supply is down year over year in the Charlotte area real estate market. For the sixth month in a row, home sales are down from the same time last year.

Jason Gentry, president of the Charlotte Regional Realtor Association and Carolina Multiple Listing Services Inc, said “It’s typical to see sales decline in areas that have experienced prolonged inventory shortages. Although the Charlotte region has experienced six months of decline in year-over-year sales; we are optimistic that sales in the market will continue at a steady pace based on positive pending sales and new listing activity.”

When you dig into the numbers from the monthly CRRA report based on the data from the MLS, you see that in the Charlotte area, sales dropped 9.8% from 4,012 to just 3,617, a decline of 395. When you look at the first 10 months of 2018, sales are down 2.1% from 41,622 to 40,767, a drop of 855.

Inventory was down yet again from 11,009 last October to 10,055 this October, a decline of 8.7%. This leaves the region with a 2.5 month supply of homes on the market. A balanced market between buyers and sellers is generally considered to be a 6 month supply of inventory. It is still above the low spot in March of this year when there were just 8,208 homes on the market which was just a 2 month supply.

New listings and pending sales were both up year over year. There were 4,796 new listings in October, up 6.9% over last year. Year-to-date new listings are still down slightly. When you look at the first 10 months, new listings were down 0.4% so not quite the recovery we need to see to balance the market. Pending sales were up 5% year-over-year to 4,091. Year-to-date pending sales were still down, but by 1.2%.

Prices for homes were up from last year at this time. The average home sold for $278,634, up 6% from last October. This is a little bit lower than the average from September when the average home sold for $281,533. It’s also down from August when the average home sold for $294,107. All of these prices were up over last year, but it may be the beginning of a trend of correction in the market.

The CRRA report covers 12 counties in North Carolina and 4 counties in South Carolina. There can be fluctuations within an area and some of the numbers can appear extreme due to small sample size.

If you are interested in buying or selling a home in the Charlotte area, give us a call at (704) 525-4045. You can view current listings and create custom searches on our website here.