Existing Home Sales Continue To Pick Up Steam According To The Latest Ten-X Residential Real Estate Nowcast

IRVINE and SILICON VALLEY, Calif., May 2, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Ten-X, the nation's leading online real estate marketplace, has released its latest Ten-X Residential Real Estate Nowcast which projects continued growth in existing home sales for April in the wake of first quarter regulatory and weather-related closing delays. According to the Ten-X Residential Real Estate Nowcast, April existing home sales will fall between seasonally adjusted annual rates of 5.3 and 5.7 million, with a targeted number of 5.52 million – a 3.6 percent increase from March and a substantial 7.4 percent year-over-year gain.

"U.S. home sales have recently been subject to volatility on a monthly basis, mostly due to external factors," noted Ten-X Chief Economist Peter Muoio. "However, beneath that volatility are clear signs that sales activity is floating at a relatively high level overall. And, while concerns remain over broader trends such as global economic volatility, weak first quarter U.S. GDP growth, and persistently lower oil prices affecting energy-based companies, the U.S. housing market stands firmly on solid ground supported by a solid labor market."

The National Association of Realtors® (NAR®) recently reported a sharp 1.5 percent year-over-year increase in sales to 5.33 million units in March – a bounce back led by a high number of closings in the Northeast region (a 3.2 percent month-over-month increase) following February's weather-driven slowdown, as predicted by the Ten-X Residential Real Estate Nowcast for March. Last month's nowcast called for an increase to 5.32 million units in March, nearly hitting the 5.33 million mark and outperforming the consensus estimate of 5.27 million.

"Online activity by prospective home buyers continues to signal the slow but steady growth that we saw in existing home sales during the first quarter of 2016, " said Ten-X Executive Vice President Rick Sharga. "Job creation, wage growth, low interest rates, and stronger household formation numbers are offsetting some of the headwinds that have hampered the housing recovery for the past few years."

NAR recently reported a 5.7 percent year-over-year increase in median existing home prices to $222,700 for March, marking the 49^th consecutive month of year-over-year gains and falling within the range of $209,207 to $231,229 predicted by Ten-X in last month's nowcast. Findings from the Ten-X Residential Real Estate Nowcast suggest that sales prices for existing homes will fall between $218,770 and $241,798 in the month of April with a targeted price of $230,284, representing 3.4 percent month-over-month and 5 percent year-over-year gains.

About the Ten-X Residential Real Estate Nowcast Model

The Ten-X Residential Real Estate Nowcast combines industry data, proprietary company transactional data and Google search activity to predict market trends as they are occurring – weeks before the findings of other benchmark studies are released. Building upon the groundbreaking work by Google Chief Economist Hal Varian, Ten-X's nowcast model extends a traditional autoregressive-forecasting model to incorporate contemporaneous information that provides significantly enhanced accuracy.

Existing Home Sales

Sources: Google, NAR, Ten-X

Existing Home Sales Pricing

Sources: Google, NAR, Ten-X

About Ten-X

Ten-X is the nation's leading online real estate marketplace and the parent to Ten-X Homes, Ten-X Commercial and Auction.com. To date, the company has sold 200,000+ residential and commercial properties totaling more than $37 billion. Leveraging desktop and mobile technology, Ten-X allows people to safely and easily complete real estate transactions entirely online. Ten-X is headquartered in Irvine and Silicon Valley, Calif., and has offices in key markets nationwide. Investors in the company include Google Capital and Stone Point Capital. For more information, visit Ten-X.com.

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20160106/319955LOGO

SOURCE Ten-X