Pending home sales in Miami-Dade and Broward counties continued to rise in March as Realtors said both local and international buyers are being lured by cheap properties and bargain-basement interest rates. In Miami-Dade, the number of people who agreed to purchase a home in March was up 6.4 percent versus February at 9,751 homes and condos. Compared to year-ago levels, the number of pending home sales was up 71.7 percent, the Realtor Association of Greater Miami and the Beaches reported Monday.
In Broward County, pending home sales increased 4.9 percent versus February to 8,173 homes. Compared to last year, pending sales in Broward were up 69.5 percent.
Pending sales are recorded when a contract has been signed but the transaction has yet to close, making the data a good barometer of future sales.
Combined with home sales that inched higher in February, the data paints a picture of a market on the mend.
The Realtor Association of Greater Miami and the Beaches said about 30 percent of the activity can be attributed to foreign buyers. While Europeans seem to be making most of their purchases along the beaches, Latin American buyers — particularly Venezuelans and Colombians — tend to look for single-family homes in gated communities, RAMB Chairman Terri Bersach said.
FOREIGN FACTOR“We’re seeing an incredible amount of international buyers,” Bersach said. And while conventional wisdom suggested foreigners were solely focused on high-end properties, the data suggests their “buying seems to be in tune with our average sales prices,” she said.
National pending home sales figures, which run one month behind the local data, rose in February after being pummeled by bad weather the previous month.
SPRING SURGEThe National Association of Realtors said Monday its seasonally adjusted index of sales agreements rose 8.2 percent from January to February.
The report “may signal the early stages of a second surge of home sales this spring,” said Lawrence Yun, the trade group’s chief economist.
Home sales had been sluggish during the winter, partly because shoppers felt less rushed after lawmakers extended the deadline to qualify for a tax credit. First-time buyers can get a tax break of up to $8,000 if they sign a contract by April 30. Lawmakers also added a credit of $6,500 for existing homeowners who move.
The report suggests the tax credit “is finally having some renewed impact on demand,” wrote Ryan Wang, an economist with HSBC Securities.
The biggest month-to-month increase was in the Midwest, where pending sales rose by nearly 22 percent. Sales posted gains of 9 percent in the South and Northeast, but fell nearly 5 percent in the West.
TESTED AGAINHowever, the housing market will be tested in the second half of the year as government support fades away.
Unless the tax incentive is extended again, the jump in home sales “will prove temporary and another setback will occur before too long,” wrote Joshua Shapiro, chief U.S. economist at MFR.