How Weather Affects Home Sales

I hadn't stopped to think about it until just recently, but weather patterns can have a distinct, and sometimes dramatic, affect on your local real estate market.

A few months ago I put a property on the market where I live in Seattle. It's a brand new home in a new community which won several development awards for its sustainable features and overall design. Normally, a property like that would bring in amazing foot traffic and an eventual offer in just a few weeks on the market.  However, winter weather, extreme cold, and more than a few all-day rain showers kept the potential buyers away.

What happened on the East coast was even worse, as people struggled to dig themselves out of almost three feet of snow for over a month.  The latest homes sales figures released by the National Association of Realtors confirms the effect that weather has on the real estate market, showing single family home sales down 1.4 percent over the month.

Further, distressed homes accounted for 35 percent of all sales, eroding the market further and bringing single family home prices down 2.1 percent to a median price of $164,300 nationally.

In the end, NAR estimates the current housing supply at 8.6 months with over 3.59 million homes currently on the market. Considering the shadow inventory debate, the increase in supply, caused in part by winter weather or not, will certainly lengthen the time of any possible housing recovery.

For more info on the NAR release read this article here.