Home sales and median home prices have reached another all-time high in the fourth quarter of 2015, ending the year in stable grounds for the Texas real estate market, the Texas Association of Realtors said.
"Texas has enjoyed four straight years of booming real estate growth and record-high housing demand," said Leslie Rouda Smith, chairman of the Texas Association of Realtors. "While 2016 might not turn out to be another record year for Texas real estate, housing demand will likely remain strong and home prices will likely continue to rise over the next year. Four years of housing inventory shortages have created a backlog of housing demand across the state - particularly in Texas's metro areas."
According to the press release of the Texas Association of Realtors in PR NewsWire, home sales in Texas throughout 2015 have increased by 4.1 percent from 2014 to 309,090, the first time that the annual Texas home sales have topped 300,000. In the fourth quarter of 2015, Texas home sales were at 0.3 percent from the same quarter in 2014 to 70,150 homes. Meanwhile, the high demand-low supply problem of the housing market continues to affect the median price of homes in the Texas area. The median price of a Texan home in the fourth quarter of 2015 was $195,000, up 5.5 percent from the same quarter of the previous year.
The 2015-Q4 Texas Quarterly Housing Report also showed that the housing inventory of Texas has slightly increased throughout 2015. The fourth quarter of 2015 ended with 3.4 months of supply compared to the 3.1 months of the fourth quarter of 2014. The housing inventory should reach between 6.0 and 6.5 months supply every month in order for the supply and demand to balance, said the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University.
"Falling oil prices and drilling activity are just beginning to significantly impact the Texas real estate market. The full effects have yet to be seen," said Jim Gaines, Ph.D., chief economist with the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. "However, the decline of the energy sector could add much-needed housing stock to the market, filling labor shortages in the home-building industry and helping the Texas housing market move towards a more balanced market for buyers and sellers."
In the fourth quarter of 2015, homes for sale tend to stay four days shorter in the market, as compared in the fourth quarter of 2014, from 64 days to 60 days. The amount of active listings in the fourth quarter of 2015 had risen to 86,976, a 12 percent, 12.8 percent year-over-year increase.