Connecticut Housing Market Posts Encouraging Gains in January

Sales of single-family houses in Connecticut in January posted the highest volume for the month since 2008 and prices rose for the fourth consecutive month on a year-over-year basis, according to a new report today.

House sales rose to 1,519 in January, a 14-percent jump compared with 1,332 for the same month a year ago, The Warren Group reported this morning, The volume was the highest for the month since 1,653 sales were recorded in January, 2008, the publisher of The Commercial Record said.

The median sale price rose to $215,000, a 2.4 percent increase above $210,000 for the same month a year ago.

“We ended 2012 on a pretty positive note, and this is carrying into January,” said Timothy M. Warren Jr., the Warren Group’s chief executive said. “Recent pending sales data are a hopeful sign for a strong spring market.”

House sales rose in six of the state’s eight counties in January, with Hartford County showing the strongest, year-over-year gains. Hartford County sales rose 33 percent, to 410 from 308 a year earlier. Sales fell in New Haven and Tolland counties.

The median sale price — in which half the sales are above, half below — increased in five of eight counties, with Litchfield County seeing the biggest jump, up nearly 18 percent. The median fell in Fairfield, New London and Tolland counties.

Hartford County’s median price inched up 2.4 percent in January, to $196,000 from $191,450 a year earlier.

Statewide, house sales increased on a year-over-year basis in every month last year, but it wasn’t until October that prices began to inch up. In a typical housing recovery, the price gains follow an uptick in sales.

Warren said low inventory is helping to push up prices.

“This should in turn give sellers more confidence to put their homes on the market,” Warren said.

Mortgage rates remain low and pending sales indicate that the spring housing market could be strong, Warren said. But the state has only seen lackluster job growth, which could moderate the recovery, economists have said.