Illinois housing market

The Illinois Association of Realtors® (IAR) maintains that the Illinois housing market is still a buyer’s market, with January 2010 beingthe fifth consecutive month of year-over-year home sales increases while the statewide median price rose for the first time sinceSeptember 2007.

The IAR stated in a report issued Feb. 26 that statewide condo sales and single-family home sales in January 2010 were up 14.0 percent, to 5,483 homes sold, from January 2009 sales. The median price in January 2010 was $145,300, up 0.2 percent from$145,000 a year ago.

“Current conditions remain favorable for buyers with interest rates still hovering near 5 percent and just over two months remaining to take advantage of the homebuyer tax credits before the April 30 deadline to have a purchase contract in place for first-time buyers and current homeowners who want to buy their next home,” said IAR President Mike Onorato. 

In the Chicagoland Primary Metropolitan Statistical Area (PMSA), year-over-year home sales were positive for the seventh consecutive month, up 29.2 percent to 3,922 homes sold  in January 2010 compared to 3,035 in January 2009. The median home sale price for the Chicagoland PMSA was $175,000 in January 2010, down 5.4 percent from $185,000 in January 2009. The Chicagoland PMSA takes in Cook, DeKalb, DuPage, Grundy, Kane, Kendall, Lake, McHenry and Will counties.
In fact, according to the IAR, the Illinois housing market has improved in 34 of 99 Illinois counties reporting. Home sales increased 35.8 percent in Cook, 25.3 percent in DuPage, 18.4 percent in Lake; 28.8 percent in  McHenry, and 5.4 percent in Will County.

Geoffrey J.D. Hewings, director of the Regional Economics Applications Laboratory  of the University of Illinois, said foreclosed properties continue to have more of a detrimental affect on median prices in Chicago  than in the rest of Illinois. He said evidence suggests median price increases will moderate statewide in February, March and April, remaining about the same as those a year earlier; while in Chicago, the median prices will be about six percent below comparable 2009 prices, but sales will increase more in Chicago than the rest of the state.

In Chicago, sales of condos and single-family home were up 31.1 percent in January  over the year. The median sale price for Chicago condos and single-family homes in January 2010 was $195,000, a 4 percent drop from a year ago. The 2010 Illinois housing market has started off with an increase in the number of units sold in January over the same period in 2009.

"We remain hopeful that while distressed properties are being absorbed, homebuyers on the fence will take advantage of the extended and expanded homebuyer tax credit, and consider this a great time to buy a home,” said Genie Birch, president of the ChicagoAssociation of Realtors®.