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New home trend numbers released today are showing the impact the COVID-19 pandemic is having on residential real estate throughout the U.S., adding a new dimension to the nation’s inventory-starved housing market.
April is historically one of the busiest months for residential real estate, but showed a sharp decline this year.
The St. Louis metro area shows a decline of 41 % in new home listings, and active listing count is down by 17.8%, as sellers take their homes off the market. The Northeast, the region hit hardest by the pandemic, saw the greatest decline in new listings at 59.4%. It was followed by declines of 49.5% in the Midwest, 44.1% in the West, and 31.4% in the South.
“Although we saw sharp drops in new listings, an increase in the time it takes to sell a home and a flattening of prices in April, May is likely to see some of these metrics worsen,” said realtor.com chief economist, Danielle Hale. “Just how significantly the housing market is impacted by the pandemic will depend on how effective the country is at containing the virus and how the economy responds. If all goes well, we could see buyers returning to the market aggressively this summer to make up for the spring they lost.”
The combination of a decline in new listings and many sellers opting to delist their properties pushed the total number of homes for sale across the U.S. down 15.3% year-over-year. April’s drop in inventory amounted to a loss of 189,000 listings compared to this time last year.
View the full report at realtor.com.
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