Home prices up 15% for year

Median sales price …. $207,000…………..$179,000 ……… up 15.6 percent

Average sales price …. $267,000 ………….$238,000 …….. up 12.2 percent

Source: Atlanta Board of Realtors, First Multiple Listing Service

Note: Median price means half of home prices are higher, half are lower. The average is the sum of all prices divided by the number of sales.

The price of homes sold in metro Atlanta climbed at a double-digit pace during the past year, according to a closely-watched report released Monday.

According to a report released Monday by the Atlanta Board of Realtors, the median price of a home sold in the region during November was $207,000, up 15.6 percent over the same month of last year.

While higher prices may be a challenge to some potential buyers, the rise is good news for homeowners – at least in the areas of the region where real estate has been making a solid recovery. Owners who have equity in the property get a boost to their net worth and the option of borrowing against it.

Those who want to sell are more likely to reap a greater reward.

Meanwhile, the number of sales was down 10.6 percent in the past year, but the deceleration was uneven. There were proportionately more sales among higher-priced homes and fewer at the low end.

“We’ve seen good movement in the higher end,” said Todd Emerson, president of the Atlanta Board of Realtors. “We are just not moving that much inventory at the low end, but some places – especially the places with good school systems – are almost back to their peak prices.”

In a related report Monday, foreclosure notices for the year were down 46 percent from 2013. Tens of thousands of Atlantans lost homes in the past several years, but the decline signals an improving economy in which fewer homeowners are struggling just to make their monthly mortgage payments.

Foreclosure notices dropped 46.2 percent this year, according to a report by Kennesaw-based Equity Depot. Counting the December notices, the region finished the year with 27,431 notices.

Foreclosure notices are for auctions on county courthouse steps that would take place the following month. But many foreclosure notices do not end in auction and the loss of a home. Equity Depot has estimated that roughly half of properties whose owners get notices end up being sold, although some experts say it is fewer.

Whenever homes are foreclosed they typically sell at a large discount and dampen prices in the area. The decline in foreclosures is one reason for rising prices.

But the Atlanta market has been wildly uneven since the burst of the housing bubble in 2007 and the painful recession that followed – damage that was worse in metro Atlanta than in nearly any other region of the U.S.

Worse, in many areas of Atlanta there has been virtually no recovery, even though metro-wide prices have been on the rise for two years. Moreover, some areas – especially on the north side of Atlanta and the near suburbs – have seen strong sales. That’s largely anecdotal; the Board of Realtors does not break down prices or sales by county or city.

Sales typically slow through fall and into winter and this year was no exception: The number of homes sold plummeted 25 percent from October to November, according to the Atlanta Board of Realtors.

The sag of sales will likely continue through the winter – as it usually does, said Emerson.

The pool of homes for sale continues to be relatively shallow: about four months. But that inventory was still much deeper than it was a year ago, according to the board.

The modest supply of for-sale homes is another reason that prices have been rising – at least in the areas where there is strong demand. But those higher prices should lure more owners to put their homes up for sale as the spring sales season approaches, Emerson said.

“Georgia is expected to outpace the rest of the United States again in 2015 in economic growth,” he said. “We are really bullish about the spring market.”