June Home Prices Up 19%, Sales Volume Weakens After Hitting Four-Year High in May

SEATTLE, July 15, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Technology-powered real estate brokerage Redfin (www.redfin.com) today released its Real-Time Home Price Tracker for June 2013, showing home prices increasing 19 percent year over year across 19 major U.S. markets. Strong price increases continue to support growing inventory, which increased for the third consecutive month. However, home sales faltered in June, with a minor year-over-year gain, and a loss from May. While still firmly in seller's territory, the June numbers indicate a trend toward a more balanced market.

Home prices:

• National home prices increased 19% year over year in June and rose 4% since May.

Inventory:

• The number of homes for sale was down 19% from June 2012, but increased 2.4% month over month. This is the third month-over-month increase in a row.

Sales volume:

• Home sales rose 2.7% from 2012, but fell 5% from May.

This report is the earliest monthly analysis of home prices, sales and inventory across 19 U.S. markets, published weeks before any other index, based on the local databases used directly by Realtors to list properties and record sales. Click the following link to read the complete Redfin Real-Time Home Price Tracker. http://www.redfin.com/research/reports/real-time-price-tracker

Market-Specific Highlights and Lowlights:

Home prices:

• Home prices in all 19 markets were up year over year and month over month.
• Sacramento, San Francisco and Las Vegas yet again had the highest year-over-year price increases, gaining 38%, 34%, and 33%, respectively.
• Philadelphia saw the smallest gain in prices, with a 3.1% increase year over year.

Inventory:

• Chicago and Phoenix were again the only markets where inventory came in higher than it was a year earlier, with Chicago up 2.3% and Phoenix up 10%.
• Sacramento saw the largest year-over-year inventory decline with a 48.3% drop. Boston followed close behind with a 45% drop.
• Cities with the largest monthly gains in inventory included Ventura (11%), Sacramento (10.4%), Denver (7.8%), Seattle (7.4%) and Los Angeles (6.5%).
• Las Vegas, Philadelphia and Phoenix were the only three markets where inventory declined in June.

Sales volume:

• Ten markets saw sales increase from last year, four fewer than in May. Just six markets saw an increase in monthly sales volume.
• New York's Long Island again posted the largest yearly sales volume increase, with home sales up 66.9% from June 2012.
• Long Island also had the largest monthly increase in sales volume, up 15.6% from May.
• California's Inland Empire saw the most drastic year-over-year decline in sales volume, with a 16.7% drop from June 2012.
• Phoenix had the sharpest month-over-month decline in sales volume, down 15.8% from May.

About the Real-Time Home Price Tracker
As a brokerage with access to dozens of Multiple Listing Services (MLSs) used by real estate agents to list properties and record sales, Redfin gets data within minutes of a sale, pending sale or listing activation, well before any government, media or analytics organization. Using MLS fields, Redfin is able to distinguish houses from condominiums and townhouses, which often sell for less money. To validate the accuracy of the data and to account for sales not handled by a real estate agent, Redfin compares MLS data with county records as they become available, using sophisticated algorithms to identify and resolve disparities about square footage or price for each address. Data at the local and neighborhood level are available in a spreadsheet, and the report methodology is available as an Adobe document.

About Redfin
Redfin (www.redfin.com) is a technology-powered real estate broker that represents people buying and selling homes. Founded and run by technologists, Redfin has a team of experienced, full-service real estate agents who are advocates, not sales-people, earning customer-satisfaction bonuses, not commissions. Redfin's online tools feature all the broker-listed homes for sale, as well as for-sale-by-owner properties that don't pay brokers a commission. Because Redfin is a brokerage and a member of the multiple listing services (MLSs) in each market it serves, Redfin's website and mobile apps show all the agent-listed homes for sale, and does not show any homes as active that are already off the market. The company serves 22 U.S. markets and has closed more than $8 billion in home sales. In 2012, Redfin was named one of The DIGITAL 100: World's Most Valuable Private Tech Companies by Business Insider. Follow us on our blog (blog.redfin.com), Twitter (@redfin), and Facebook (facebook.com/redfin).

SOURCE Redfin