After a dip in July, August Summit County real estate sales rebounded somewhat posting gains in both dollars and the number of transactions. The number of closed sales in August rose 6.5 percent from the prior month to 262 while dollar volume was up 19.8 percent to $304.2 million.
The year over year comparisons, as expected, were not quite as favorable. The increase in dollar volume from August of 2020 was only 3.7 percent while the number of transactions actually fell 28.8 percent.
Year to date, dollar sales are up 78 percent and transactions up 42 percent. Those are impressive increases but well short of the triple digit gains we were seeing earlier in the year. We expect gains to continue to moderate as we compare against the strong COVID related recovery last fall.
Average selling prices (ASPs)continue to be on the rise. Year to date, the ASP for single family properties hit $1,640,000. That is up 30.3 percent from this time a year ago. The ASP for multi family units is up 6.3 percent to $717,132. As a comparison the ASP for a single family home in the Denver market is $841,000 and for multi-family $448,000.
In August, the very high end of the market was the standout. With 14 sales over $3 million that segment represented 6.4 percent of all closed transactions. For all of 2020, that segment accounted for only 2 percent of sales. The bottom half of the market continues to run well below the trend.
Inventories Remain Tight
Nationally, housing inventory has been in an upward trend since April. While Summit County did see a seasonal pick up in the Spring (on a sequential basis) inventories peaked in August have had significant declines the last two months. At the end of September, there were 168 residential properties listed for sale, down 15.6 percent from August. The number represented a 27.3 percent drop from a year ago. Single family homes were fairly steady month to month but active listings for multi family properties were down 30.4 percent.