Lawler: Early Read on Existing Home Sales in March; Look for a Big Jump

From housing economist Tom Lawler:

Based on state and local realtor/MLS reports I’ve seen from across the country, I estimate that existing home sales as measured by the National Association of Realtors ran at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of about 5.18 million in March, up 6.1 % from February’s pace and up 10.2% from last March’s seasonally-adjusted pace.

On the inventory front, I project that the NAR’s measure of the inventory of existing homes for sale at the end of March will be 1.96 million, up 3.7% from February and unchanged from a year ago. Finally, I estimate that the NAR’s estimate of the median existing SF home sales price in March will be about 8% higher than a year earlier.

The NAR is scheduled to release its March existing home sales report on April 22nd. I will send out an updated projection near the middle of next week.