Following the April drop in new home sales amid record high average prices, existing home sales tumbled 2.5% MoM (considerably worse than the 0.9% drop expected) to 5.36m SAAR.
Purchases fell in three of four regions, including a 2.9 percent decline in the South and a 3.3 percent drop in the West
Notably, while single-family home sales decreased 3 percent last month to an annual rate of 4.84 million, purchases of condominium and co-op units rose 1.6 percent to a 620,000 pace.
Median sales price rose 5.3% YoY to $257,900.
“We are seeing no breakout in home sales,” Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief economist, said at a press briefing accompanying the report. “We are stuck in this narrow range at a time when the economy is doing well.”
“However, inventory shortages are even worse than in recent years, and home prices keep climbing above what many home shoppers can afford,” Yun said in a statement.
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