October home sales showing glimpse of stability in inventory throughout Chatham-Kent

Residential home sales activity recorded through the MLS® System of the Chatham-Kent Association of REALTORS® numbered 129 units in October 2020. This was down 6.5% (nine sales) from October 2019.
On a year-to-date basis, home sales totalled 1,126 units over the first 10 months of the year. This edged down 3.8% from the same period in 2019.
“MLS® home sales in Chatham-Kent came closer to historically average levels in October.” said Michael Gibbons, President of the Chatham-Kent Association of REALTORS®. “New listings outpaced sales this past month, helping to stabilize the declining the number of active listings. However, current overall inventory is still hovering only slightly above the lowest levels in history. Meanwhile, average price continued its trek higher, setting a new record for the third time in four months.”
The average price of homes sold in October 2020 was a record $329,495, a large increase of 33.3% from October 2019.
The more comprehensive year-to-date average price was $305,327, rising 21.6% from the first 10 months of 2019
There were 156 new residential listings in October 2020. This was up 6.8 (10 listings) on a year-over-year basis.
Overall inventory continues to hover slightly above the lowest level on record. Active residential listings numbered 138 units at the end of October. This was a large decline of 35.2% from the end of October 2019.
Months of inventory numbered 1.1 at the end of October 2020, down from the 1.5 months recorded at the end of October 2019 but below the long-run average of 4.5 months for this time of year. The number of months of inventory is the number of months it would take to sell current inventories at the current rate of sales activity.