The median sale price of homes in the markets served by Redfin increased 8.8% in February compared to a year earlier
The real estate firm says that the gains were the strongest for the month since 2014 and took the median sale price to $285,700. It marked the 72nd consecutive month of gains year-over-year.
Sales on the other hand were pretty flat with just a 0.4% rise year-over-year as tight inventory worsened 11.4%.
Demand remained strong though with competitive markets seeing sales speed up by a week compared to February 2017, with homes selling in an average 53 days. More than 1 in 5 homes sold for above asking price.
"Mortgage rates pushed upwards in February to the highest levels in nearly three years as home prices increased by their fastest pace since March 2014," said Redfin Chief economist Nela Richardson. "A growing economy, healthy buyer demand and low inventory drove the ramp up in prices last month. Combining even slightly higher rates with price growth this strong will make it even more challenging for first-time buyers to find affordable homes to buy this year.”
Seattle, WA was the fastest market, with half of all homes pending sale in just 8 days, down from 12 days from a year earlier. Denver, CO and San Jose, CA were the next fastest markets with 9 and 10 median days on market, followed by Oakland, CA (13) and San Francisco, CA (14).
The most competitive market in February was San Jose, CA where 83.1% of homes sold above list price. It was also the market where prices gained the most at 34.1% year-over-year to a median $1.18m.
