Median home prices, new listings move higher in Florida

The housing market in the state of Florida saw higher median home prices, more real estate listings and a higher number of active listings during the month of January, according to data released Thursday by Florida Realtors, a state-based trade organization for real estate professionals.

The figures in each metric are higher compared to the same attributes from one year ago, but a spike in interest rates have also had impacts on the state’s real estate market.

“Mortgage interest rates above 6% continued to impact potential homebuyers’ purchase power, while also contributing to a lock-in effect among would-be home sellers who bought their homes years ago with a mortgage rate of 3% to 4.5%,” the association explained in an announcement.

The hope is that a potential cooling of interest rates will contribute to a stronger market in 2024, according to Florida Realtors President Gia Arvin, a broker-owner with Matchmaker Realty in Gainesville.

“We’re seeing positive signs that for-sale inventory is beginning to increase in many local markets across the state, which should encourage buyers who may have been waiting on the sidelines,” Arvin said in a statement. “It looks like mortgage rates may be starting to ease, and if that continues, we should see more pent-up demand translate into closed home sales.”

Closed sales of single-family homes grew 0.6% from the same period last year, reaching 14,851. Sales of existing condominiums and townhouses fell 1.2% from January 2023, reaching 6,008 units, according to Florida Realtors data compiled from local boards and associations.

Prices also continue to rise at a steady clip, with the median sales price for single-family existing homes reaching $405,000, an increase of 3.8% from the same time last year. Condos and townhouses saw their median price rise to $320,000, up 3.2% from January 2023.

“While sales and prices remained fairly similar compared to a year ago, we saw significantly more new listings this January,” Brad O’Connor, chief economist for Florida Realtors, said in a statement. “New listings of single-family homes were up 16.7% year over year, while new listings of townhouses and condos were up by 31.4%.”

The January trends are largely a continuation of ones observed over the past few months, O’Connor said. This stems from “abnormally low numbers of new listings in late 2022 and early 2023, mostly due to how fast mortgage rates were rising at that time,” he added.

But the addition of new inventory has also pulled the Florida housing market out of multiyear lows.