Buyers rejoice! Every single metric in the Northeast Florida Association of REALTORS® (NEFAR) Market Statistics report for July shows the housing market making a shift towards a balanced market. Although the market is not totally balanced yet, stabilization is on its way, and that is good news for buyers.
“July statistics showed a continued stabilization of the real estate market in Northeast Florida towards a traditional balanced marketplace,” said 2024 NEFAR President Rory Dubin. “Despite a worsening economy and high inflation, median prices were down slightly, and the Home Affordability Index was up. Days on market are longer, and inventory of homes to purchase is higher,” he said.
Specifically, over Northeast Florida’s six-county region, the median sales price for single-family homes inched down by less than half a percentage point to $398,970. Meanwhile the Home Affordability Index crept up 1.6% to register at 65.
The Home Affordability Index measures housing affordability for the region. In other words, it measures whether a typical family earns enough to qualify for a mortgage on a typical home, based on current interest rates, median income, and median home prices. A higher number means greater affordability. This index measures affordability factors for all homebuyers making a 20% downpayment. An index of 100 is defined as the point where a median-income family has the exact amount of income needed to purchase a median-priced existing home. An index value over 100 means that the family has more than enough income, while a value below 100 means that a family doesn’t have enough income to qualify for a mortgage loan.
July’s median for days on the market rocketed up 20% to 42 days and the active inventory of homes shot up 11.6% to 7,897 homes, indications that the market is more conducive to buyers.
Other metrics of note: Month to month, closed sales in the six-county region dropped 4.8% to 1,868. Pending sales plummeted 20.3% to 1,387, while new listings rose 3.9% to 3,318.
NEFAR’s market reports are available at nefar.com.
