For the second month in a row, the volume of new homes sold was the greatest it’s been in over eight years. The Northeast led the gain.
Home buyers purchased 57,000 new
houses during July — the most new residential properties sold during any month since October 2007.
During the previous month, sales of new
homes were a downwardly revised 53,000, while the total was 43,000 in the same month last year.
Data from the Census Bureau and Department of Housing and Urban Development, which jointly reported the latest statistics on Tuesday, indicate that new home sales from Jan. 1, 2016, through July 31 totaled 352,000.
On a seasonally adjusted basis,
the annual rate of new home sales was 654,000 last month — the strongest annual rate since October 2007’s 727,000.
“This rise in new home sales is consistent with our builders’ reports that market conditions have been improving,” National Association of Home Builders Chairman Ed Brady said in a written statement. “As existing home inventory remains flat, we should see more consumers turning to new construction.”
The rate was a downwardly revised
582,000 in June 2016 and a downwardly revised 498,000 in July 2015.
The biggest month-over-month gain was in the Northeast, where the seasonally adjusted annual rate soared 40 percent from the prior month to 35,000 in July.
Sales jumped 18 percent from June in the South to a 398,000 annual rate, while the Midwest inched up 1 percent to 84,000 in July.
At an annual rate of 137,000
last month, there was no change in the West.
There were a seasonally adjusted 233,000 new U.S.
houses for sale as of July 31, 2016, down 3 percent from a month earlier but up 8 percent from a year earlier.
At the current rate of sales, it would take 4.3 months to clear out the U.S. new-home inventory.
The supply was 4.9 months in June and 5.2 months in July 2015.
July 2016’s median sales price was $294,600, while the average price was $355,800.
