Michigan Housing Market Wrap-Up: 2006 Home Sales, Detroit Housing Prices Fall

It was tough to sell a home last year in Michigan.

Sales of existing single-family homes were down nearly 14 percent from Jan. 1-Nov. 30, 2006 compared with the same period in 2005, the Michigan Association of Realtors said Monday.

Home sales fell even more sharply in some parts of metropolitan Detroit. In Monroe County, sales for the first 11 months of 2006 were down nearly 30 percent from year-earlier levels, as Michigan mortgage activity significantly decreased; in Livingston County, the year-to-year decline was nearly 25 percent.

The city of Detroit resisted the downward trend. Existing-home sales in the state’s largest city were up 7.6 percent in the first 11 months of 2006 compared with a year earlier.

Weak demand for housing made 2006 a slow year for builders in metropolitan Detroit. Home builders in nine southeast Michigan counties took out 48 percent fewer permits in 2006 than in 2005, according to Housing Consultants Inc. of Clarkston.

Slumping home sales, while hard on sellers and home builders, are a potential bonanza for buyers, said Irvin Yackness, executive vice president of the Building Industry Association of Southeastern Michigan.

“All of these things make this a great time to buy,” Yackness told the Detroit Free Press. “[Mortgage interest rates] historically are very low. That is a very positive reason for buying.”

U.S. Census figures released in October said home prices in Detroit where the least expensive among America’s 15 largest cities, with a median value of $88,300.

The National Association of Realtors reported in November that the median home price in metropolitan Detroit from July-September was $154,100. That was down about 10.5 percent from the same period in 2005.