March Home Sales Show Decline As Ice Storm Puts Chill On Market

March didn’t help Spokane County home sales to rebound from the decline it’s been experiencing compared to last year.

Home sales dropped 10 percent during the first quarter of 1997 as compared to the first three months of 1996. Last year, 871 sales had closed by March. This year, that figure fell to 778, according to the Spokane Association of Realtors Multiple Listing Service.

March sales also fell 10 percent when compared to last March.

Greg Benner, president of the Realtors association, attributed the decline to the weather. Sales were lost in the aftermath of November’s ice storm.

Though the sales figure lags behind the same number from last year, he said, “The effect of the ice storm is behind us and we expect sales to gradually grow during the year to the figures established in 1996.”

And, he added, figures already are picking up. “The month of April has started off with a bang with 44 closed home sales reported on April 1.”

Home sales can take up to 45 days or more to close. Thus, home sales figures generally are representative of sales activity during the prior two months.

“The figures you’re looking at are winter figures,” said Dave Nerren, of Windermere, The Tupper Group. “We’ve had the longest winter I remember having.”

That also contributed to the fact that homes took a week longer to sell in the first quarter of 1997 than they did in 1996, Nerren said.

The Valley continued its strong pace of numbers of new homes sold. Of the 86 homes sold there, 25 - or 29 percent - were new.

The Northwest area led the pack in both numbers of homes sold and in price, with 103 homes sold for an average of $128,646. But homes there took the longest to sell, staying on the market for an average of 102 days.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Graphic: Home sales