Vegas home sales slip as prices continue fall

By Buck Wargo

Thursday, Sept. 10, 2009 | 9:12 a.m.

The red-hot Las Vegas housing market cooled off a bit in August as home and condo sales dropped and prices edged lower.

The Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors reported today that the 3,229 sales of single-family homes in August were 14 percent less than July when 3,738 homes sold.

The median price of homes sold in August fell 2.4 percent to $135,500, from $138,800 in July, according to the Realtors.

Overall, total sales of homes, condominiums and town houses fell from 4,602 in July to 4,039 in August, the group reported.

Condominium and town house sales fell by 6.3 percent to 810 in August. The median price was down 1.1 percent to $66,288.

Despite the drop in sales, GLVAR President Sue Naumann said the numbers posted in August show demand is high. Sales were 27 percent higher than August 2008.

Bank-owned properties accounted for 70.5 percent of all home sales, down from recent months, she said.

The Realtors reported 20,999 homes and 5,508 condos and town houses were on the market at the end of August. Both categories increased by more than 2 percent over July.

The group began tracking a new category in August: the number of homes and condos available for purchase. That excludes homes that don’t have pending or contingent offers.

That category shows 8,579 homes and 2,545 condos and town houses avaiable. The median price for available homes was $185,000 — $30,000 higher than when contingent and pending sales are included.

That shows how much of the activity is centered on lower-priced properties, analysts said.

“It appears that in August only 41 percent of the nearly 21,000 total reported listings did not have an offer,” said John Restrepo, principal of Restrepo Consulting. “This is an encouraging sign.”