Chicago home sales had been declining now for several years but the Coronavirus really tanked the market in May and June of 2020. The market returned to more normal levels starting in July and is now setting new records.
Chicago Home Contract Activity
The good news is that we are still setting records for home sale contracts written during the time period that I’ve been tracking this, with this year running 0.9% ahead of last year and 25.7% ahead of 2019. So we are poised to continue to set sales records for another month or two since contracts lead closings by that much.
Chicago home sale contract activity is still showing tremendous strength relative to historic levels.
Pending Home Sales
Pending home sales continue to decline from the highs set last year, losing 491 units in September. However, it remains higher than 3 of the other past 4 years. So they continue to support closings but with a diminished capacity to do so.
After hitting historic lows the backlog of homes likely to close in the next 1 – 2 months rebounded during the pandemic but is now starting to retreat again
Distressed Home Sales
Distressed home sales have fallen to a negligible portion of Chicago’s real estate market, representing only 1.8% of the total in September, down from 2.8% last year. It’s hard to believe it can go much lower but the foreclosure moratorium has been depressing this number. Now that it has expired we should see this percentage rising over time.
Since the housing crisis the percentage of home sales that are distressed has steadily declined to almost negligible levels.
Chicago Home Inventory
Given how tricky it has been to measure Chicago’s home inventory levels during the pandemic I continue to use my own calculation rather than the canned programs available to realtors. Both detached and attached inventory reached new lows for September with only a 2.3 month supply of detached inventory and a 4.2 month supply of attached inventory. It’s still a great time to be a seller in Chicago – perhaps even during the off season this year.
After a big Coronavirus induced spike in April 2020 the inventory of homes for sale dropped back down. Both detached and attached inventory keep setting new record lows.
Chicago Home Sale Market Times
With such low inventory levels it should be no surprise that homes are selling incredibly fast. The average detached home sold in only 44 days in September – a record low for that time of the year – with half the homes selling in 17 days or less. Attached homes took slightly longer to sell this year than last – 67 days with half the homes selling in 32 days or less.When the pandemic first hit Chicago market times rose but now they are actually quite a bit lower than last year. Detached homes are at a record low.
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