Having ended last year on an upward trajectory, the pace of new single-family home sales in the U.S. gained another 7.9 percent in January to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 764,000 sales and is now running 18.6 percent higher than at the same time last year.
At the same time, the median price of those homes which sold last month jumped 7.4 percent to $348,200, which was 14.0 percent higher than at the same time last year, driven by an increase in higher-end sales, while the inventory of new single-family homes for sale across the county inched up 0.6 percent to 327,000 but remains 6.3 percent lower on a year-over-year basis.
And out West, the seasonally adjusted pace of new single-family home sales jumped 23.5 percent in January to an annual rate of 252,000 sales, which is 49 percent above its mark at the same time last year, with 11.7 percent fewer homes on the market (83,000) than at the same time last year.