Sacramento Real Estate Market Update – August 2024

Let’s talk about the Sacramento Real Estate market for August 2024. The new home market was on a tear this month and the resale market is starting to head into the fall slowdown.  This is creating some opportunities for smart buyers and smart sellers.

Let’s get into the details.

New Home Sales

New home sales in the greater Sacramento area rebounded sharply in August to the second-highest total in 20 years after a July lull likely caused in part by the historic heat wave that month.

BIA members reported selling 605 homes during the month in the region. That was up 40% from the 433 sales reported in July and 6% higher than the unusually high 573 homes sold in August 2023. The average number of sales for the month regionwide is just 406. This year’s monthly sales were the most during an August since 633 sold during the pandemic year of 2020 and were the second highest since 874 were sold in 2004 during the height of the turn-of-the-century housing boom.

Sacramento County again saw the most sales (372) followed by Placer County with 151. Sales in Roseville rebounded nicely to 114 from just 62 the previous month to regain the lead. Rancho Cordova was just behind at 112, followed by Elk Grove (77), Sacramento (74) and Folsom (56.) See the graphs below for more insights.

Let’s talk about the resale market:

Average Home Price

Based on data from Trendgraphix, the average home price for August was $672,000. That’s a decrease of 2.2% compared to last month and an increase of 1.8% from August of ‘23.

Average Price Per Square Foot

The average price per square foot in Sacramento was down1.2% to $343, compared to July and up 2.1% from this same period last year.

Number of Homes Sold

In July, a total of 1,694 homes were sold, an decrease of 4.2% from July and down 2% from this time last year. Pending sales were down 1.1% compared to last month and are up 7.4% from July of last year.

Months of Inventory

Inventory increasing slightly to 2.1 months. This is still a strong seller’s market, but it does give buyers a little more strength in making decisions as homes that are priced incorrectly are sitting longer on the market.

With inventories slightly rising, effective marketing and proper pricing strategies are critical right now. If you’re a Seller, make sure you’ve chosen an experienced professional to properly market and sell your home.

If you’re a buyer, the same goes for you. Hiring a professional in this market is more critical than ever, especially when the market is flooded with part-time amateurs.

Mortgage Rate Stats

Rates have continued to dropped this past month with favorable economic outlook into the low 6% range. Builders are offering some amazing rate incentives on the limited inventory homes they have. We have a few you can get some great deals on right now, but those are going to disappear quickly given the current pace of new home sales.

Opinion

New homes is where the deals are right now. You can see that in the stats I just shared. Builders are helping buyers bridge the affordability gap and making deals happen.

The resale world is in the first month of the new wild west era of its new rules. Buyers are confused, Sellers are Confused and Agents are Confused. The new rules that went into effect to allegedly protect the consumer, so far, in my opinion have made things significantly worse for the consumer. We’ll see how things shake out, but there will be more changes as we all learn the new normal brought about by these class action lawsuits.

You can see that shift in the sales stats in August as more people took a pause in buying and selling. Things will normalize, but it will take time for the market to adjust.

My best advice for you is to make sure you choose a Real Estate Professional to provide services for you. It is more critical that ever. Whether that’s someone from our office or one of the great full-time, experienced and educated professionals in the region, pick a good one.

Closing

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Please make sure to like this video, subscribe, and hit the notification bell so you never miss a market update. I’m Christopher Brown with NEXT Real Estate Group and Next New Homes Group. See you next month!