Home builders picked up the pace of new home sales last month, and it was markets located in the West that had the biggest improvement.
Government housing data released Wednesday indicate the annual rate of new home sales was
a seasonally adjusted 490,000 in November.
New home sales picked up from the previous month’s 470,000 rate. The October data was revised down from 495,000 originally reported.
The numbers came from the Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The increase was more substantial versus the upwardly revised 449,000 annual U.S. rate as of the same month last year.
The biggest month-over-month increase was in the West, where new home sales soared 21 percent from October to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 0.135 million.
In the South, sales rose five percent to 0.277 million.
But the Midwest saw a nine percent decline to an 0.053 million annual rate, while sales in the Northeast plummeted 29 percent to an 0.025 million annual rate.
Without any seasonal adjustments, there were 34,000 new U.S. homes sold during November.
The
bureau reported that there were a seasonally adjusted 232,000 new homes for sale at the end of last month. The inventory expanded from 227,000 a month earlier and 210,000 a year earlier.
At the current rate of new home sales, it would take 5.7 months to clear out the inventory.
The number of months was 5.8 in October and 5.6 in November 2014.
The
average sales price of a new U.S. home sold during November was $374,900, while the median price was $305,000.
