Listen to this articleHome sales on Long Island improved last month, as the number of listings continued to climb and interest rates began to fall.
There were 2,381 homes contracted for sale in Nassau and Suffolk counties last month, up 15.5 percent from the 2,060 Long Island homes contracted for sale in July 2023, according to preliminary numbers from OneKey MLS.
The rise in pending July sales was welcome news for those in the area’s residential real estate industry after a disappointing first half of the year, when the number of closed home sales fell 4.6 percent from the first half of 2023.
Another good sign is the increasing supply of available homes for sale. There were 5,804 Long Island homes listed for sale with OneKey MLS—2,529 in Nassau and 3,275 in Suffolk—as of Wednesday. That’s an increase of 13.2 percent from the 5,127 Long Island homes that were listed for sale at the end of July 2023.
Home prices on Long Island continue to soar. The median price of closed home sales, which includes single-family homes, condos and co-ops, was $790,000 in Nassau last month, an increase of 9 percent from the $725,000 median price recorded a year ago and a new all-time high.
In Suffolk, the median price of closed home sales was $631,500. That’s 9.7 percent higher than the $575,000 median price recorded in July 2023, though slightly lower than the $640,000 median in June 2024.
Perhaps the best news for the housing market is a decline in interest rates, as mortgage rates have dropped to their lowest level in 15 months. As of Tuesday, the average interest rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage in New York is just under 6.4%, according to NerdWallet.com.
And industry observers expect rates to fall in the second half of the year. National Association of Realtors Chief Economist Lawrence Yun said the Federal Reserve may make a cut of 50 basis points in September.
“Mortgage rates are plunging on the news of weak job growth and rising unemployment. The 4.3 percent unemployment rate is the highest since coming out of the COVID lockdown and higher than the 3.5 percent unemployment rate right before the COVID-19 arrival. The hourly wage gain of 3.2 percent is the weakest in three years,” Yun said in a written statement last week. “The Fed was late moving away from the restrictive monetary policy stance when early signs of a softening economy were visible. Soft manufacturing survey data, falls in construction activity, and damaging financing costs for small businesses clearly hint at a cooling economy and further cooling in inflation.”
For those who count on a healthy housing market here on Long Island, things are generally looking up.
Chris Roberti, director of strategic growth for Hartford Funding, a Woodbury-based mortgage lender, has noticed more optimism on his sales floor.
“A colleague of mine noticed we’re kind of ‘normal busy’ again, if that makes sense,” Roberti said. “It’s not crickets anymore. You can kind of have that sense that we’ve overcome the hard part of this all and it seems like people are ready to buy, people are ready to look into some refinance options, so there’s certainly some optimism in the air. And that’s without even taking into consideration the rate cut that all signs are pointing towards happening in September.”