We knew it was coming, but the headline from the May stats is still jarring. The number of sales was less than half of what it was in May 2019.
In fact, you have to go back over 5 years to find a month with fewer sales. That we hit this low in May, which is usually our busiest time of the year, is remarkable.
Of course, this is directly attributable to COVID-19. Remember that our stats for closings reflect properties that typically went under contract 30-45 days earlier. That falls in the heart of when we were all staying at home and going stir crazy. May should be the bottom for the closed sales numbers. It will be interesting to see how much of a rebound we see in June.
Now, for some better news. As we’ve started to open things back up, the number of people putting their homes on the market has bounced from the dismal number of new listings in April.
There should be pent up demand on both the selling and buying side. The number of listings on the market stayed pretty steady, as it has since this whole pandemic mess started. That tells me those additional new listings were bought up pretty quickly.
Finally, the median sales price came back to reality in May.
We set a record last month, mostly due to the fact that condo sales had taken such a hit that the overwhelming majority of sales comprised of higher-priced single family homes. We’re basically at the same point we were last year, which more accurately represents what’s really going on out there.
The June stats will tell us how close to “normal” buyers and sellers feel.
