The median sales price of a home sold in the Hampden, Hampshire and Franklin counties fell by 0.05 percent from $180,000 in May 2010 to $179,900 in May 2011.
SPRINGFIELD – Home prices held steady across the Pioneer Valley in May according to statistics released Monday by the Realtor Association of Pioneer Valley.
The median sales price of a home sold in the Hampden, Hampshire and Franklin counties fell by 0.05 percent from $180,000 in May 2010 to $179,900 in May 2011.
The number of homes sold fell 21.7 percent though, from 411 in May 2010 to 322 in May 2011.
“The weather killed the first part of our year and last year we had the stimulus to make people come out,” said Linda S. Rotti, sales manager at the Jones Group Realtors in Amherst.
The stimulus Rotti mentioned was the federal income tax rebates offered to home buyers. The statistics released Monday include transactions that closed in May even though offers might have been accepted months earlier.
Those rebates expired in June 2010, said Kevin M. Sears, an owner and broker at Sears Real Estate on Belmont Avenue in Springfield. But Sears said the gap between 2010’s stimulus-inflated sales numbers and 2011’s results has been shrinking in recent months .
Vincent M. Walsh, president of the Realtor Association of Pioneer Valley, said it is a good sign that prices held steady while volumes fell.
“Hopefully that’s a sign of stability moving forward,” Walsh, who is an office manager with Coldwell Banker in Longmeadow and East Longmeadow, said.
The statistics do not reflect the impact of the June 1 tornadoes.
Also, sales figures have been increasing month-to-month, up 29.3 percent regionwide from 249 sold in April to 322 in May. The median price fell 1.2 percent month-to-month from $182,000 in April 2011 to $179,900 in May 2011.
Over the past six years, the median sales price has decreased 6.1 percent from $191,600 in May 2005 to $179,900 in May 2011.
In Hampden County alone, the region’s largest real-estate market, sales were down 25 percent from 296 in May 2010 to 222 in May 2011. The median price fell 3.5 percent from $171,000 to $165,000.
In Hampshire County, sales were down just 2.7 percent from 73 to 71. The median price was down 12.1 percent from $282,000 to $248,000.
In Franklin County, sales were down 31 percent from 42 to 29. The median sales price rose 10.6 percent from $160,000 to $177,000.
Walsh said any true recovery in the real estate market depends on improved consumer confidence. the said inventories are good and interest rates are favorable. A 30-year fixed rate mortgage averaged 4.50 percent with an average of 0.7 points for the week of June 16, 2011. It was up from 4.49 percent a year ago . Last year, the average was 4.75 percent, according to FreddieMac.com.
