by Calculated Risk on 7/09/2023 08:12:00 AM

Realtor.com has monthly and weekly data on the existing home market. Here is their weekly report from economist Danielle Hale: Weekly Housing Trends View — Data Week Ending July 1, 2023

• Active inventory declined, with for-sale homes lagging behind the year ago levels by 2%. As we report the surge in inventory that occurred in 2022 as higher mortgage rates were priced out by many home shoppers, the number of homes for sale was not kept up. With 1 in 7 homeowners choosing not to sell this year citing high mortgage rates, and even 4 in 5 home shoppers (82%) report feeling locked-in by their existing low-rate mortgages, the housing market is not getting the influx of homes for sale that it typically does, and this is reflected in what’s available for sale. We expect inventory in 2023 to continue to struggle to keep pace and likely decline for the year as a whole.

• New listings–a measure of sellers putting homes up for sale–were down again this week, by 21% from one year ago. The number of newly listed homes has been lower than the same time the previous year for the past 52 weeks–an entire year. And this week’s data shows a more modest gap than the prior two weeks, but it’s still on par with what has been typical year-to-date. The economy continues to be relatively resilient despite higher interest rates which have dampened homeowner interest in selling. The lack of existing inventory has led to a stronger market for new home sales.

Here is a graph of the year-over-year change in inventory according to realtor.com.

Inventory was down 2.1% year-over-year – this was the second consecutive YoY decrease following 58 consecutive weeks with a YoY increase in inventory.

Inventory is still up from the record lows in the 2nd half of 2021 and early 2022, and it is unlikely we will see new record lows this year.