Home sales and inventory declined for another month, while prices increased in Chicago and across the state last month.
Year-over-year home sales were down 12 percent from 1,867 in September 2023 to 1,643 deals last month, according to Illinois Realtors. Available inventory also decreased by 9 percent with just 5,254 homes for sale in the city compared to 5,768 homes on the market a year ago.
These trends can be attributed to “an oversupply of downtown condos” and an “undersupply of single-family homes in the neighborhoods just outside of downtown,” said Mario Greco, a broker and founder of The MG Group.
“The need to buy and sell was still evident in the decrease of days on market and increase in median sales price,” said Erika Villegas, Chicago Association of Realtors president and owner of RE/MAX in the Village.
Home sales dropped 10 percent in the nine-county Chicago Metro Area, but the number of homes for sale increased 5 percent year-over-year in September. The Chicago Metro Area includes the counties of Cook, DeKalb, DuPage, Grundy, Kane, Kendall, Lake, McHenry and Will.
Statewide trends looked similar with an 8.5 percent drop in home sales this September compared to a year ago, and a 6 percent increase in the number of homes for sale.
Inventory is higher than last year because it is taking longer to sell homes than before, Greco said. Buyers have been more uneasy because of NAR’s August policy overhauls, the November election and mortgage rates, he said.
“Uncertainty breeds reticence, and we are seeing that now,” Greco said.
Affordability remains a concern for buyers, said Geoff Smith, executive director of the DePaul Institute for Housing Studies. However, he predicted that this will lessen as statewide housing inventories increase and mortgage rates come down.
The average rate for a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage was 6.18 percent in September, down from 6.50 percent in August. The average rate in September of last year was 7.20 percent, according to Freddie Mac data aggregated by Illinois Realtors.
“Our three-month forecast expects statewide closed sales activity in the fourth quarter of 2024 to be about 6 percent lower than levels seen in the fourth quarter of 2023, and prices of single-family homes are expected to increase by nearly 14 percent by the end of the year compared to December 2023,” Smith said in a news release.
The drop in homes on the market in Chicago has increased competition and upped median home prices in the city, also mirroring August’s trends. The median of $350,000 in September rose by 7.7 percent a year ago, when the median was $325,000.
Statewide, the monthly median home price for September was $290,000 — 7.4 percent higher than the median of $270,000 a year previously.
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Residential
Chicago
Chicago sees drop in year-over-year home sales, inventory this August