Home prices up in June nationally, lower inventory and sales
Jul 19 2012 4:07PM
As housing markets nationwide continue to recover, a real estate report for June reveals home prices increased while inventory and existing-home sales were down from the previous month.
According to data from the National Association of Realtors, the national median existing-home price for all housing types was $189,400 in June, up 7.9 percent from this time last year. Prospective buyers of homes for sale in Los Angeles County should not allow higher home prices to deter them from purchasing, as becoming a homeowner is still extremely affordable and improving prices indicate a recovering market. June marks the fourth consecutive month of year-over-year increases in home prices and was the strongest growth since February 2006.
Additionally, total existing-home sales fell 5.4 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.37 million in June from 4.62 million in May. Sales were still 4.5 percent higher than in June 2011 when there was a pace of just 4.18 million units. First-time buyers accounted for 32 percent of all home purchases in June.
"A healthy market share of first-time buyers would be about 40 percent, so these figures show that tight inventory in the lower price ranges, along with unnecessarily tight credit standards, are holding back entry level activity," said Lawrence Yun, chief economist of NAR.
