If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

The National Association of Realtors released the May, 2007 home sales numbers and they looked bleak for most of the country. The key numbers from my perspective is that we have a huge inventory overhang of 8–9 months.

Tougher lending standards and excessive inventory means that there is not going to be enough money or people to buy the low and middle class homes for a while. Builders are going to build out the projects they have in the pipeline and banks will dump their REO properties, so extra inventory will continue to be added to the marketplace and home sellers are going to feel the pinch.

Guess it is time to go buy a couple of rental properties.

The National Association of Realtors reported Monday that sales of existing single-family homes and condominiums dropped by 0.3 percent to 5.99 million units in May, the slowest sales pace since June of 2003.The median price of a home sold last month dropped to $223,700, down 2.1 percent from a year ago. It marked the 10th straight price decline compared with a year ago, the longest stretch of weakness on record.
The sales decline reflected weakness in the South, where sales dropped by 3.4 percent, and the West, where sales were down by 0.8 percent.
Sales actually showed strength in the Northeast, rising by 5.8 percent, and the Midwest, where they were up 0.7 percent.
In a troubling sign for the future, the inventory of unsold homes rose by 5 percent to 4.43 million units in May, a level that would take 8.9 months to clear out at the May sales pace. That is the highest inventory level since the last deep slump in housing in 1992. via Yahoo! Finance

Related posts:

1. Nationwide Home Sales Drop In February, 2007
2. New Home Sales Fall 11.3% from October
3. Existing Home Sales Drop 8.4 Percent Nationally in March 2007
4. April 2007 Existing Home Sales Fall 2.6 Percent
5. New Home Sales Down 22 Percent From Last Year - Dow Down 300 Points