With 100 being a healthy number, the index has not fallen year-over-year since Aug. 2014. Nevertheless, NAR forecasts 5.44 million pre-existing homes will be sold this year, a 3.7 percent increase over 2015.
As therealdeal tells MHProNews, NAR’s Chief Economist Lawrence Yun says the drop in May is attributable to the high demand and high price of sales in previous months. “Total housing inventory at the end of each month has remarkably decreased year-over-year now for an entire year,” said Yun. “There are simply not enough homes coming onto the market to catch up with demand and to keep prices more in line with inflation and wage growth.”
The Northeast suffered the largest drop in pending sales April to May, -5.3 percent. The Midwest fell 4.2 percent, the West fell 3.4 percent and the South slipped 3.1 percent. ##
(Photo credit: Associated Press/Paul Sakuma)
