Central New York home sales fall more than 50 percent in February

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Realtors in a six-county region of Central New York closed on the sale of 293 homes in February, down 50.4 percent from the 591 homes they sold in the year-prior month.

That’s according to the latest housing-market report released by the Greater Syracuse Association of Realtors (GSAR) on Friday, March 24. It continues a string of monthly home-sales declines in the region and the state.

Pending home sales (houses under contract) in Central New York also plummeted in February, declining 48.6 percent to 286 from 556 in February 2022, per the GSAR data. That foreshadows further drops in closed home sales in the next couple of months.

The inventory of homes listed for sale in the region stood at 1,223 at the end of February, an increase of 23.3 percent from 992 in February 2022.

The Central New York monthly median sales price rose 5.5 percent to $174,000 from $165,000 in the year-ago month, the association said.

“The number of homes listed for sale continues to be near historic lows, which is a contributing factor in both our median selling price growth and decline in sales compared to last February,” Nancy Quigg, GSAR president, said in the housing report. “The buyer competition for fewer homes is driving ongoing price gains, but slowing closed sales as multiple buyers are interested in the same properties. For every new homeowner we congratulate, several others will be restarting their search.”

“We remain optimistic that home sellers will return along with the spring season,” said Lynnore Fetyko, GSAR CEO. “Homeownership across Central New York remains desirable, and any gains in newly listed homes will help calm the headwinds faced by homebuyers.”

Year-to-date through Feb. 28, realtors in the CNY region sold 779 existing homes, off 40.8 percent from the 1,316 homes in the same period in 2022. The year-to-date (Jan. 1 to Feb. 28) median sales price of $175,000 is 3.4 percent higher than $169,250 a year earlier. Pending home sales for the first two months of the new year totaled 680 homes, down 36.7 percent from 1,074 homes in the same timeframe in 2022.

All data is compiled from the Central New York Information Service and includes single-family residential activity in Cayuga, Madison, Oneida, Onondaga, Oswego, and Seneca counties.

GSAR is the trade association representing more than 2,000 realtors in Central New York.