Area home sales fall 7 percent in October
918 houses changed hands last month
Homes sales across Erie and Niagara counties slid 7 percent last month compared to October 2007, but local buyers and sellers are still bucking national trends of double-digit drops.
“It’s down, but it’s a small negative compared to what’s going on in a lot of other places,” said James Knight, president of the Buffalo Niagara Association of Realtors.
According to the realty group’s monthly snapshot of residential real estate activity, a total of 918 single-family homes changed hands last month, down from 988 in October 2007. The sales tally is also off 5 percent from September.
“I think people are a little scared, even here where we’ve been isolated from the worst of the problems,” Knight said. “Buyers and sellers are hesitant and waiting to pull the trigger.”
But the real estate group chief said there is reason for optimism in October’s sales data, most notably sales prices. Last month the median home price rose 3 percent from the prior year, up to $113,000. Average price inched up to $133,014, also a 3 percent gain.
Knight, who attended the National Association of Realtors annual meeting in Orlando last week, said he talked with many of his peers who are wringing their hands over tumbling prices.
“The Buffalo housing market never saw the dramatic increases a lot of areas saw in recent years, but now we’re not experiencing the severe declines. We’re happily seeing slow, but steady growth,” he said.
The most popular home choice in October was the three-bedroom, priced between $120,000 and $139,000. Seventy- two of those units changed hands.
In the high-end sale category, seven homes priced at $500,000 and above were sold, led by the record-setting sale of Town of Hamburg estate for $3 million.
Knight said the real estate community will be paying close attention to local job loss numbers because lower employment will send bigger shivers through the housing market.
“That will bring the national crisis home to roost. When your friends and neighbors start losing their jobs, you’re a lot less interested in moving from renting to owning, or buying a bigger house,” he said.
Looking farther ahead, the BNAR chief said he doubts home sales will find their new normal until the first or second quarter of 2009.
Knight said the real estate association is giving consideration to launching an informational campaign that reminds local residents that local house values are strong and mortgage money is available at low interest rates.
“If they only absorb the national headlines, they have good reason to think there’s no way they can finance a home purchase, and if they do buy, it’s a bad investment. That’s not the case in the Buffalo market,” he said.
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