Boca Raton's March housing numbers reflect downward trend

The downward trend in the Boca Raton’s single family housing market continued in March.

According to the Realtors of the Palm Beaches and Greater Fort Lauderdale (RAPB+GFLR), single family closed home sales dropped 16.8 percent for March, in a year-over-year comparison.

A total of 193 single family homes were sold in Boca Raton during March, compared to 232 during the same period in 2018.

The news for Boca Raton’s Townhouse/Condo market was worse, as closed sales dropped 27.3 percent – 213 units sold in 2019, 293 in March of 2018.

The March report comes on the heals of a February review that showed single family closed home sales were down 13.3 percent (143 in 2019, 165 in 2018), while the townhouse/condo market actually saw a 3.3 percent increase (188 in 2019, 182 in 2018) during that time period.

Another negative note in the report was in pending sales, with the single family home market down 15.8 percent (224 in 2019, 266 in 2018), with townhouse/condo off 15.6 percent (244 in 2019, 289 in 2018).

The report did point to a positive sign as reason for hope in the home-buying market.

“The Federal Reserve recently announced that no further interest rate hikes are planned for 2019,” according to the RAPB+GFLR report. “Given the fact that the federal funds rate has increased nine times over the past three years this was welcome news for U.S. consumers … Fed actions also tend to affect mortgage rates, so the pause in rate hikes was welcome news to the residential real estate industry.”

Other key metrics from the report in the single family market were:

• Median sales price increased 1.2 percent ($460,000 in 2019, $454,750 in 2018)
• Average sales price increased 2.6 percent ($693,093 in 2019, $675,526 in 2018)
• Dollar volume decreased 13.9 percent ($133,767,019 in 2019, $155,382,861 in 2018)
• Percent of original list price received increased 1.6 percent (93.2 percent in 2019, 91.7 percent in 2018)
• Median time to contract decreased 23.1 percent (60 days in 2019, 78 in 2018)
• New listings increased 2.7 percent (379 in 2019, 369 in 2018)
• Inventory of homes for sale decreased 3 percent (1,316 in 2019, 1,357 in 2018)

Closed sales in the townhouse/condo market were down 17.5 for the first three months of 2019 – 562 sold this year, compared to 681 in the first three months of 2018.

Other key metrics from the report in the townhouse/condo market were:

• Median sales price decreased 0.4 percent ($233,000 in 2019, $224,000 in 2018)
• Average sales price increased 16.9 percent ($344,603 in 2019, $294,677 in 2018)
• Dollar volume decreased 16.5 percent ($72,065,320 in 2019, $86,340,302 in 2018)
• Percent of original list price received decreased 0.2 (91.7 percent 2019, 91.9 percent in 2018)
• Median time to contract increased 11.6 percent (77 days in 2019, 69 in 2018)
• New listings increased 1.7 percent (419 in 2019, 412 in 2018)
• Inventory of homes for sale decreased 2.8 percent (1,291 in 2019, 1,328 in 2018)

For more information on the Boca Raton and southern Palm Beach County housing market, stop by Petruzzelli Real Estate at 2325 N. Ocean Blvd. (A1A) in Boca Raton or contact them at 561.362.8413.