Home sales in the four-county metro Milwaukee area rose 4.3% in January, year-over-year, to 848, but the average home sale price fell 2.2% to $328,745, according to the latest report from the Greater Milwaukee Association of Realtors.
For the greater seven-county southeastern Wisconsin region, home sales were up 3.0% for the month, year-over-year, to 1,134.
Here’s the January home sale breakdown by county:
- Milwaukee, 535, +9.2%
- Kenosha, 105, +6.1%
- Washington, 64, +1.6%
- Waukesha, 200, -0.5%
- Racine, 112, -1.8%
- Walworth, 69, -8.0%
- Ozaukee, 49, -16.9%
Listings of homes for sale in the four-county metro area were up 12.4% in January, the sixth consecutive month of a year-over-year increase in listings. However, GMAR says the local housing market is still “hundreds of listings behind where it needs to be to satisfy buyer demand.”
GMAR says the metro Milwaukee housing market remains “a very tight market in favor of sellers.”
In 2023 there were 1,624 new home construction permits pulled in the four-county metro Milwaukee area, according to GMAR, down 15.2% from 1,915 new home construction permits pulled in the area in 2022.
New home construction in the area has been at low levels ever since the housing market collapse during the Great Recession, GMAR says.
More recently, the rise in interest rates to combat inflation means many current homeowners have mortgages with lower interest rates, which provides a disincentive for them to sell and buy another home with a mortgage at a higher interest rate. That has also dampened the local housing market and the inventory of homes listed for sale, GMAR says.
“It does not appear that the market will achieve any kind of balance to benefit buyers in the near future,” GMAR states in its January market report.
