U.S. Sees Record Low Home Sales Listings

The number of homes for sale across the country has fallen to the lowest level on record.

Fewer than 700,000 homes were listed for sale with U.S. real estate agents in December, according to a new report by Realtor.com.

Nationwide home sales listings are down almost 40% from December 2019 levels.

“The shortage of homes for sale has been an ongoing issue for the last couple of years, but in December the combination of the holiday inventory slowdown and the pandemic buying trend caused it to dip to its lowest level in history,” Realtor.com chief economist Danielle Hale said in a new report. “Looking forward, we could see new lows in the next couple of months as buyers remain relatively active, but a surge of new COVID cases may slow the number of sellers entering the market. Newly listed properties have shown mixed trends.

“We eventually expect to see improvements in the supply of homes for sale, especially in the second half of the year,” Hale said. “Until then, finding a home will continue to be a top challenge for buyers across all price ranges”

The shortage of homes for sale in many areas has caused prices to jump.

Nationwide the median listing price of homes for sale was up 13.4% year-over-year in December.

Dallas-Fort Worth area home sales list prices were 5.5% higher than in 2019, according to Realtor.com.

The median time it takes to sell a D-FW home last month was 52 days – down 13% from a year earlier.

The D-FW area is one of just nine U.S. metro areas where home listings have fallen by more than 50%. The decline in the area fell by almost 52% in the last year.

The greatest percentage inventory declines were in Riverside, Calif., down 56.5%, and Austin, down 55.9%.

The number of houses listed for sale with North Texas real estate agents is at the lowest point in almost three decades.

Only about 10,000 single-family homes are current listed with real estate agents for sale in the area — only about a 1.1-month supply.

With COVID-19, many sellers have chosen not to put properties on the market which has added to the tightening of supply.

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