New Residential Home Sales Slowest On Record

By Peter Fowler at 25 Aug 2010

The Commerce Department says new residential home sales in July fell to the lowest rate on record dating back nearly 50 years.

Sales of new single-family houses in July 2010 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 276,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

This is 12.4 percent below the revised June rate of 315,000 and is 32.4 percent below the July 2009 estimate of 408,000.

The median sales price of new houses sold in July 2010 was $204,000; the average sales price was $235,300. The seasonally adjusted estimate of new houses for sale at the end of July was 210,000.

This represents a supply of 9.1 months at the current sales rate.