Stable Prices, Skyrocketing Sales: DC Real Estate in 2015

• January 13th 2016

by UrbanTurf Staff

The DC area real estate market saw prices level off, sales shoot up and inventory continue to struggle to keep up with demand in 2015.

These conclusions were published in a comprehensive year-end report of the regional housing market by RealEstate Business Intelligence on Wednesday. Below, UrbanTurf highlights some of the report’s findings.

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Home Prices

2015 was the year that the rapid rise in home prices in the region began to level off. The median price for the DC area clocked in at $410,000, just a 1.1 percent increase over 2014. Prices in the region are now just 1.2 percent below 2007 levels, according to the report, when the median price was $415,000.

Real estate is of course local, and there were jurisdictions where homes prices increased modestly. In DC proper, prices rose 4.8 percent to $523,000 and in Prince George’s County, prices increased 6.3 percent to $235,000.

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Sales Volume

There were 50,528 closed home sales in the region in 2015, a 9.4 percent increase from 2014 and the highest total for the area since 2006. Fairfax County led the way with 14,850 sales.

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Inventory

The supply increases in the regional housing market are a little deceiving. New listings in the area increased 8.5 percent year-over-year and the overall supply of listings on the market rose 4.6 percent. However, inventories are significantly below the 10-year average of 12,574 listings and RBI expects the growth in supply to be negative in 2016.

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Days on Market

About 50 percent of the homes that sold in 2015 did so within three weeks of hitting the market, which is actually a bit slower than 2014. If you are buying or selling in DC proper, homes are selling about twice as fast — the median days on market was 12 last year.

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/stable_prices_skyrocketting_sales_the_year_in_dc_real_estate/10746.