There was an increase in sales of new homes in the Rochester, NY market in October year-over-year, but signs of market leveling were showing as the percentage rise was less than September 2011. Sales rose 2.3% from a year earlier to 44, relative to an 11.5% climb in September from the year earlier.

A total of 545 new homes were sold during the 12 months that ended in October, up from 544 for the year that ended in September.

As a percentage of overall housing sales, new home sales accounted for 6.5%. This is up from the 4.9% of sales a year earlier. Following a year-over-year decline in September, sales of new and existing homes also slid year-over-year in October.

For newly sold homes, the average price moved from $245,783 in October 2010 to $244,570 in October 2011. This came after a 18.0% lift in September year-over-year.

The average mortgage size on newly sold homes moved south year-over-year in contrast to new home prices. It declined to $199,117 in October, a 3.4% decline. In September 2011, average mortgage size on newly sold homes saw a 50.9% rise year-over-year from a year earlier. For new home sales, the percentage of the sale price that was being financed slipped 2.4 percentage points year-over-year to 81.4% in October 2011. This was a swing downward after a 20.1 percentage point bump in September from a year earlier.

The percentage of new home sales belonging to single-family homes has risen from last year while the portion of new home sales belonging to attached units has dropped. Single-family home sales rose from 93.0% of new sales in October 2010 to all of sales in October 2011. At the same time, the share of new home sales belonging to attached units declined to no part of sales from 7.0% of sales.

Foreclosures and real estate owned (REO) sales did not appear to be dragging the market. Together, foreclosures plus REO sales represented 7.1% of existing home sales. They made up 14.9% in October 2010. The percentage of existing home sales involving foreclosures dipped to 5.1% in October from 6.9% a year earlier while REO sales as a percentage of existing home sales declined to 2.1% from 8.1% a year earlier.

Please refer to the ABOUT THIS MSA tab to learn more about geographic coverage and data availability in this market area.