DC Home Prices Rise 7.8% in March

• April 10, 2012

by Shilpi Paul

While a report out today about the DC area housing market reveals that the trends of the past few months — a low inventory of homes, high contract activity — continue, the big news was about home prices. In March 2012, the median sales price for homes in the region was $345,000, 7.8 percent higher than one year ago.

The report from RealEstate Business Intelligence (RBI) outlined price increases for various property types: Condo and co-op prices rose have risen 14.1 percent since March 2011, sales prices of detached properties rose 7.8 percent, and townhome prices increased by 4.2 percent. (Keep in mind that these statistics include the entire region noted below; for more granular statistics of specific zip codes or areas, click here.)

Click to enlarge.

This morning’s report also revealed that there were 10,503 active listings on the market in the region in March, up from February (9,823) but noticeably down from 14,261 in March 2011. While there are fewer active listings than last year, more contracts were signed: 5,671 last month, a 4.4 percent increase over March 2011.

Buyers may have less to choose from, but along with that trend, the number of foreclosures hitting the market has decreased markedly. From the report:

The number of new traditional listings, those not involving foreclosures or short sales, was actually 6.9% higher than last March, marking the third consecutive month with an annual increase in new traditional listings. Only 1 in 20 new listings are under foreclosure (4.8%), down from 8.9% last March and 1 in 10 listings in March 2010 (10.4%).

The area that RBI analyzes includes DC, Montgomery County, Prince George’s County, Alexandria City, Arlington County, Fairfax County, Fairfax City, and Falls Church City.

This article originally published at http://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/march_housing_report_home_prices_increases/5390