Southern Nevada home prices level off this summer

Local home prices are leveling off this summer as the housing supply has stopped shrinking but still remains tight. That’s according to a report released this month by the Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors.

GLVAR reported the median price for existing single-family homes sold in Southern Nevada through its Multiple Listing Service during July held steady at $290,000.

That’s the same as June, but still up 11.5 percent from $260,000 in July of 2017. The median price of local condos and town homes sold in July was $166,000, down slightly from June, but up 20.3 percent from the same time last year.

“Local home prices had been on the rise for most of 2018, but have been slowing down this summer,” said GLVAR President Chris Bishop, a longtime local Realtor. “Sales have been leveling off, too. We’re glad to see the housing supply increasing slightly in recent months, but our inventory is still very tight. That tight supply has been dragging down home sales. At this rate, we’re on pace to sell fewer existing homes this year than we did last year. And it may be some time before local home prices get back to their all-time peak from 2006.”

According to GLVAR, the median price of existing single-family homes sold in Southern Nevada peaked at $315,000 in June of 2006. Prices hit a post-recession bottom of $118,000 in January of 2012.

Southern Nevada now has less than a two-month supply of existing homes available for sale when a six-month supply is considered a balanced market.

By the end of July, GLVAR reported 4,787 single-family homes listed for sale without any sort of offer. That’s up from June but still down 4.2 percent from one year ago.

For condos and town homes, the 878 properties listed without offers in July represented a hefty 40.5 percent increase from one year ago.

The total number of existing local homes, condos and town homes sold during July was 3,955.

Compared to one year ago, July sales were up 1.4 percent for homes and up 17.2 percent for condos and town homes.

GLVAR reported that 22.6 percent of all local properties sold in July were purchased with cash.

That compares to 24.6 percent one year ago. That’s well below the February 2013 peak of 59.5 percent, indicating that cash buyers and investors are still active in the local housing market, but have been playing a much smaller role than they were five or six years ago.

At the same time, the number of so-called distressed sales continues to drop. GLVAR reported that short sales and foreclosures combined accounted for 2.9 percent of all existing local home sales in July, down from 6.4 percent of all sales one year ago.

These GLVAR statistics include activity through the end of July 2018.

GLVAR distributes statistics each month based on data collected through its MLS, which does not necessarily account for newly constructed homes sold by local builders or homes for sale by owners. Other highlights include:

■ The total value of local real estate transactions tracked through the MLS during July was nearly $1.1 billion for homes and nearly $136 million for condos, high-rise condos and town homes. Compared to one year ago, total sales volumes in July were up 11.1percent for homes and up 31 percent for condos and town homes.

■ Homes and condos continued to sell faster than last year at this time. In July, 89 percent of all existing local homes and 89.5 percent of all existing local condos and town homes sold within 60 days. That compares to one year ago, when 82.2 percent of all existing local homes and 87.7 percent of all existing local condos and town homes sold within 60 days.

GLVAR was founded in 1947 and provides its more than 14,000 local members with education, training and political representation. The local representative of the National Association of Realtors, GLVAR is the largest professional organization in Southern Nevada. Each GLVAR member receives the highest level of professional training and must abide by a strict code of ethics. For more information, visit www.LasVegasRealtor.com. E-mail your real estate questions to ask@glvar.org.