The National Association of Realtors (NAR) is full of great information at the moment about the ever growing and changing Real Estate market! Although custodians of the national data, they do of course release information relevant to local real estate markets.
They have just released their monthly pending home sales data and the news is excellent all round.
The Pending Home Sales Index has risen for the fifth consecutive month – the first time in six years since it has done that!
The index rose nationally 3.6% to 94.6 from an upwardly revised reading of 91.3 in May, and is 6.7% above June 2008 when it was 88.7. The last time there were five consecutive monthly gains was back in July 2003.
Locally here in the West of the nation the index rose 2.9 percent to 100.4 – here in Malibu there has been a marked increase in activity.
With affordability being great at the moment, it is important to keep an eye on NAR’s Housing Affordability Index as an indicator of what the market is doing. They have just released the latest for the index and it stood at 159.2 in June, down from record peaks in recent months but it remains 36.6% points above a year ago. Under these conditions the typical family would devote 15.7% of gross income to mortgage principal and interest, well below the standard allowance of 25%. Now is definitely the time to buy, despite lending being tight!
Here is a video from NAR on the latest data:
If you are interested in purchasing a property or selling a property in Malibu, Pacific Palisades or the surrounding Beverly Hills/southern California area then please contact Judy Kunisaki for professional real estate advice in the Westside Los Angeles area, on 310-317-8396 or via her online contact form on her website.
Subscribe to our blog using our RSS feed. (Click here!)
Judy Kunisaki – CA DRE license 00963582
One Trackback
[...] have all heard the press shouting about how housing affordability has improved, well, here in California the news is great. The California Association of Realtors has [...]