DFW Area Sees Decline in Number of Homes Sold, But Prices Hold Steady

12:00 AM CDT on Thursday, September 10, 2009
By STEVE BROWN / The Dallas Morning News
stevebrown@dallasnews.com


North Texas home sales fell by double digits in August from a year earlier.
But despite the steep decline, prices are holding up.

Local real estate agents sold 6,338 pre-owned homes though their Multiple Listing Service last month – a 15 percent falloff from August 2008, according to the latest statistics from the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University and North Texas Real Estate Information Systems Inc.

For the first eight months of 2009, home sales are down 19 percent compared with the same period last year. But median sales prices have fallen only 2 percent and were unchanged last month at $150,000.

The latest data is in line with recent national reports that show only modest declines in local home values – unlike the big drops still being experienced in many U.S. markets.

But analysts say it's probably too early to say for sure that North Texas residential values won't go a bit lower.

Any home price rebound will depend on a recovery of the local job market and the number of foreclosed homes coming on the market, said James Gaines, a research economist with the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M.

"So far, the D-FW market has absorbed these kinds of sales [foreclosures], and while there are individual neighborhoods or subdivisions where prices have fallen dramatically, the effect has not shown up as a major impact on the total market," Gaines said.

"Naturally, job loss is a primary cause of foreclosures and distressed sales, so the real culprit is the local economy.

"Dallas – like most of the rest of Texas – has sustained job losses since the first of the year," he said. "The losses need to stabilize and then reverse into gains for people to feel good about buying a home and having the income to do so."
The best news in the current local housing report is that the number of homes for sale continues to decline from year-ago levels.

At the end of August, 38,166 homes were listed for sale in the area, 14 percent less than a year earlier. That's about a 6.5-month supply.

"The key to house price stability is that there is not a surplus of listings," analyst Ted Wilson of Dallas-based Residential Strategies said. "Many households have elected not to put their houses on the market, and that has gone a long way to keeping prices firm.

"When there is an excess supply of housing for sale, on average it takes longer for a house to sell and, as a result, there is a tendency is for the seller to drop the price to garner buyer interest."

It currently takes 78 days on average to sell a house in North Texas. That's 3 percent longer than in August 2008.

So far this year, the smallest declines in home sales have been in properties priced below $80,000.

Sales of pre-owned homes with price tags of $600,000 and more have dropped more than 30 percent.

Agents and builders say that the federal homebuyer tax credit aimed at first-time purchasers has caused an uptick in sales of low- and moderate-price housing.
The tax credit expires at the end of November.

A second report released Wednesday predicted that despite continued sales declines, the Dallas area will be one of the top home markets in the country this year.
Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio and Wichita Falls also are on the list of what are expected to be the 10 top-performing housing markets, according to analysts at Local Market Monitor.

The study identified home markets where residential values are expected to remain level, that didn't have a housing boom and that have had modest employment declines.

"This means that Dallas-Plano-Irving will fare among the best over this next year, a factor that bodes well considering the state of the national housing crisis," a representative of the research firm said.