According to an article in the Wall Street Journal Existing-Home Sales Decline As Prices Fall, Inventories Rise (subscription required), housing remains soft.
WASHINGTON -- Sales of previously owned homes in the U.S. fell less than expected in August, as prices fell compared with a year earlier, the National Association of Realtors said Monday.
The median home price was $225,000 in August, compared with a revised $230,000 in July. Last month marked the first year-to-year median price decline since April 1995, and it was the second-biggest in the survey's 38-year history.
Home resales fell to a 6.30 million annual rate, a 0.5% decrease from July's unrevised 6.33 million annual pace. Inventories of unsold homes rose to 3.92 million, a 7.5-month supply at the August sales pace, the most since April 1993
The housing market here in Calgary, Alberta appears to be cooling off as well.
The Calgary Real Estate Board website has a list of residential statistics. For a substantial part of last year and earlier this year, the number of listings and the number of sales per month were nearly the same. During the spring season, people literally held auctions as houses were in such tight supply. But recently, a gap has formed between the number of listings and the number of sales. In August, there was slightly over 4000 residential listings and 3000 sales. So far in September, there are 5981 listings and 1686 sales. Calgary has gone from almost no inventory to about three months of inventory in a very short time span. The 30-day average residential sales price has remained reasonably firm at C$372K (U.S.$333K) and the 30-day median residential sales price at C$335K (U.S.$300K).
I believe that the softness in home sales will be one of the stronger headwinds for the economy for the remainder of this year and next.
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