Figures Show Phoenix’s Housing Market is Enjoying an Upward Trend

According to MDA DataQuick, the Phoenix housing market saw an increase in sales in February. Furthermore, for the first time since January 2007, the overall median price for homes in Phoenix market didn’t decline when comparing year-over-year data.

Within the Maricopa-Pinal counties metropolitan area, sales of both new and resale houses and condos totaled 6,824 in February. This represents a 9.6% increase when compared to the previous month as well as a 13% increase when compared to February of 2009. Although it is normal for the area to experience an increase in sales between January and February, the average increase has been 9.4% since 1994. Therefore, the increase experienced this year is slightly above average. In fact, homes sales during the month of February were the highest they have been for that month since 2007, while sales for existing homes were the highest they have been in February since 2006.

When it comes to new construction, sales were up by 17% when comparing February to January. Furthermore, while new home sales increased from accounting for 8.9% of sales in January to 9.5% of sales in February, this is still down when compared to the 12.5% total that was accomplished in February of last year. As such, it is clear that builders are still struggling to compete against the low-cost opportunities that foreclosures provide.

DataQuick also reports that foreclosure resales made up over half of Phoenix resales, though these figures were down from 52.1% in January to 51.3% in February. These figures are down significantly when compared to February of 2009, at which time the total share was 65.1%. In March of 2009, foreclosure resales reached their peak at 66.2%.

New foreclosure activity also took a dip in February. With a total of 4,635 single-family houses and condos being foreclosed upon in February, these figures were down by 6.2% when compared to January. These figures also represent an 18.4% decline when compared to February of last year.

The median price of new and resale homes and condos also saw a 2.63% increase, with prices increasing from $131,540 in January to $135,000 in February. When compared to February of 2009. These prices represented the first time in 3 years that the median price did not fall when comparing year-over-year data. Still, February’s median price went down 1.1% when compared to the December 2009 median and the price is still down by 48.9% when compared to the peak of $264,100 that occurred in June 2006. On the other hand, the median prices in Phoenix bottomed out in April of 2009 with a median price of $125,000.