A hopeful sign of the economic recovery was reported by The National Association of Realtors (NAR) last month when they found that pending home sales increased by 44.3% in May. This statistic registered the highest month-over-month gain in the index since NAR started tracking this metric in 2001.
According to the Pending Home Sales Index (PHS):
“A leading indicator of housing activity, measures housing contract activity, and is based on signed real estate contracts for existing single-family homes, condos and co-ops.”
The reason this statistic is so important is because with the shutdown of the economy in March, we saw a two-month decline in the number of homes that went into contract. With this jump in May, it indicates that buyers are back in the market and purchasing homes right now. California is one of those states were real estate has picked up and continues to increase with homes coming on the markets from northern California counties such as Sonoma and Marin on down to central coast areas like Monterey and Santa Barbara on down south California to Orange County and San Diego.
According to Lawrence Yun, Chief Economist at NAR:
“This has been a spectacular recovery for contract signings and goes to show the resilience of American consumers and their evergreen desire for homeownership…”
To continue this upswing, however, we need to see an increase in the number of new homes being built. This will help combat the lower inventory supply we face today.
In Sonoma County we have seen the resurgence of homebuilding to offset the devastating loss of homes caused by the recent fires of the past two years. It will be necessary for this building surge to continue to stabilize the housing deficit we have faced in this area for several years.
The experts seem to agree that this is an excellent time to sell or to buy property if you’ve been considering it! Don’t wait. Contact your local Realtor and if you need help with financing if you are being turned down elsewhere, give Sun Pacific Mortgage a call at 707-523-2099 to discuss your specific needs. We are a family-owned business which has been in hard money lending for over thirty years and have helped multitudes throughout our long history.
