2014 home sales lag behind 2013 in January, February

Hampton Roads:

“Real estate agents say that Hampton Roads will have a stronger housing market in 2014. Even so, recent housing reports indicate that the region lagged behind 2013 in the first two months of the year. January and February home sales were down 9 percent this year compared to the same time last year, according to the latest report from the Real Estate Information Network, the region's multiple listing service.

Home sales fell 2.1 percent in February compared to a year earlier, marking the second consecutive dip after a drop of 15 percent in January year-over year. Snow and budget uncertainty issues had been blamed for the slow start in January. Even so, one bright spot was Portsmouth, which saw a 25 percent increase in sales from February to February. Suffolk saw the largest drop by 34 percent. Active listings and pending sales remained flat. New construction sales dropped 12 percent year-over-year.”

~ Writes the Daily-Press

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A look at the 2013 D.C. region housing market data by Zip code

Northern Virginia:

“Home owners in the D.C. region don’t want to spend much time in their cars. At least that’s what we’ve learned after reviewing the 2013 housing market data. With the help of RealEstate Business Intelligence, a subsidiary of Rockville-based MRIS, we crunched last year’s numbers to get a sense of where sellers and buyers fared best in this area. We found a few surprises – Springfield and Hyattsville – and got confirmation of what we’ve long suspected. (Great Falls is an expensive place to live.)

But after speaking with a number of real estate agents to find out what they had to say about the market, one term we kept hearing was “walkability.” At every income level, home owners seem to want to walk or take public transportation to where they need to go. They’re tired of being stuck in their cars. The push to move outside the Beltway to buy a bigger house is in the past. These days buyers are sacrificing space for shorter commutes.”

~Writes Kevin Cobb of the Washington Business Jounral

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