Houston Housing Market

Despite the efforts of Ike, the Houston housing market in September continued trends set in August of Houston housing inventory reduction. Housing inventory declined from 6.8 months in August to 6.6 months in September, leaving the Houston housing market with 33,246 single family detached homes active on the market, which is a reduction of over 2,000 homes for the period.  Along with these numbers, we saw a slight uptick in the average home sale price for the year.  Although once again we have a mixed bag, home sales are down substantially for the period.  However, it should be noted that a large part of the reduction in home sales can be attributed to many businesses and people throughout the Houston metro being without power.   

Total Breakdown of Activity For The Houston Housing Market

With the huge reduction in closed sales for the Houston housing market in September, we can only attribute the 2,000 home reduction in Houston housing inventory to sellers taking their homes off the market.  It is hard to tell what percentage of these homes were permanently removed and what percentage will return after repairs, following the damage done by Hurricane Ike.

 The 80,000 and below price point moved up slightly showing 5.1 months of inventory for September versus 5 months in August.  This increase in months of inventory was due to the decreased number of sales and not an increase in total homes available on the market.  Total active listings for the 80,000 and below price point declined slightly, while all three of the other covered price points showed decreases in housing inventory for both months of inventory and total active listings.  The 80,000 to 150,000 price point had 6.1 months of inventory for September 2008, which is down from 6.3 months of inventory in August of 2008.  The total Houston housing inventory in the 150,000 to 300,000 price point fell from 6.6 months of inventory in August to 6.3 months for September.  The inventory jump noted in July at the 300,000 and above price point turned out to be a fluke, as inventory levels have declined two months in a row down from 9.6 months in July of 2008 to 9.4 months for August 2008 and now sitting at 9.2 months for the month of September.

Houston Homes Market Breakdown For 80,000 And Below

Houston Homes Market Breakdown For 80,000-150,000 Price Range

Houston Homes Market Breakdown For 150,000-300,000 Price Range

Houston Homes Market Breakdown For 300,000 And Above

Numbers for September should not be considered a strong indicator for the overall health of the Houston housing market, as Ike’s impact may have either caused a weakening of the market by damaging consumer confidence and reducing transactions simply because of businesses’ inability to operate, or it could have improved the market’s standing by causing home owners to remove their homes from the market.  I believe it will be November before we can count on the market statistics to assist us in making any kind of prediction of the Houston housing market’s direction.  In conclusion, it will be very interesting and a great economics lesson to see how the Houston housing market plays out with weakened consumer confidence and the loss of 50,000 housing units (according to University of Houston Professor Barton Smith).

Information contained in this post was acquired from the Houston Association of Realtors via the multiple listing service database and archive.  Data should be considered reliable, but is not guaranteed to be accurate.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 14th, 2008 at 11:46 am and is filed under Houston Housing Market. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.