Housing slowdown: Miami home sales fall 13% in August

Adding to mounting signs that Miami’s housing market is cooling down, home sales in the Magic City dropped 13 percent in August, year-over-year, a newly released report shows.

Closed sales fell to 3,493, compared to 4,034 sales in August 2018, according to the report by RE/MAX.

In addition to slowing sales, home prices also dipped slightly in August, compared to July, after rising for years. The median sales price declined 1.7 percent to $295,000 in August, from $300,000 in July. The median price was up 5.2 percent, year-over-year, however.

Miami’s housing market fared far worse than the national average. Nationally, closings declined 1.6 percent in August, year-over-year, according to the report.

A number of indicators are signaling that the post-crisis housing boom in Miami and nationally is coming to an end as home prices have risen to a level beyond income levels. Rising construction costs are also making it more difficult to build affordable single-family homes.

Developer Stephen Ross of Related Companies told Yahoo Finance in August the housing market “is probably in the eighth inning.”

Supporting this, a report by the startup Knock said about 88 percent of single-family homes in Miami were purchased in the first quarter after the seller lowered the price.

In addition, nationwide, single-family housing authorizations declined for three straight quarters, according to a new report by BuildFax. This includes a 4.17 percent decline in the second quarter from the second quarter of 2018.