Single-family home sales jump 25%
Maine’s existing single-family home unit sales lurched up 24.59% over a year ago in September following a robust 20% annual rise in August, according to figures from Maine Listings, a subsidiary of the Maine Association of Realtors.
The 1,307 homes that changed hands in September increased from 1,049 homes sold the same month last year. The median sales price rose 1.76% to $173,000. In August, the median sales price rose 7.06% to $182,000 over the prior year’s same month.
Maine’s numbers stand robustly against national figures, which show home sales rising 10.9% in September, with the median home price at $199,300, up 11.4% from September 2012, according to the National Association of Realtors. In the Northeast, home sales were up 15%, with the regional median sales price up 2.3% to $240,900.
“Fall is our second-busiest time of the year,” Angelia Levesque, a real estate agent with Century 21 Nason Realty in Bangor and president-elect of the Maine Association of Realtors, told Mainebiz. “A lot of people want to be in their homes before winter. There’s plenty of inventory and interest rates are low.”
Levesque said there are 29,175 active listings of all types in Maine now, and about 16,190 of those are single-family homes.
By county, Knox, Aroostook and Cumberland fared the best in median sales price, rising 16.28%, 11.88% and 10.67%, respectively, in rolling-quarter comparisons of July 1, 2013 to Sept. 20, 2013 versus the same time period the previous year. By units sold, Franklin grew a healthy 53.52%, with Knox and Lincoln counties each topping 35% growth.
By comparison, Washington and Piscataquis counties were down around 30% each in median sales price, but each was up, by 27.87% and 10%, respectively, in units sold period-to-period.
Part of the reason the numbers changed so dramatically in areas like Washington County is because the units sold are so small that a very high- or very low-priced property can greatly alter the results, Levesque said.
Overall, sales in southern Maine have been very strong, especially around Portland. Sales also have done well in Bangor, Brewer and Hampden, but downtown area properties are getting snatched up more quickly than in the countryside, similar to the trend in Portland.
“People want to be on natural gas, and they want city services,” said Levesque. “Younger people are getting back into the market, and they want conveniences like stores and broadband.”
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