Final data for May 2011 is available this morning so I will be updating my Austin Market Dashboard this week. For now I just want to offer a quick summary.
First, home sales (units) in Austin and Central Texas are still down year-over-year, about 10% from May 2010 to May 2011, but the gap was narrower last month, and the year-to-date trend is encouraging (data courtesy of the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University):
Of course, monthly sales growth this time of year is normal, but “normal” seasonality has been a little less predictible in recent years than before 2007.
It is also worth noting that both average and median sale prices in May 2011 were the highest they have been since July 2010. (As I have commented before, July 2010 was distorted by the end of homebuyer tax incentives in June 2010. That left very few entry-level buyers still in the market in July, so the average price was dominated by move-up purchases in higher price ranges than usual.)
At first glance, this is an encouraging report for last month. I’ll post more thorough analysis over the next few days.
Bill Morris on Austin Real Estate 
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