Despite the latest Federal Reserve interest rate increase this week, the demand for housing has remained strong. Popular real estate platform Zillow expects existing-home sales to increase 4.8% year-over-year to 6.42 million in 2022. While increased mortgage rates have reduced refinancing demand lately, home sales value has been increasing. This can be attributed to increased investments in homes and real estate amid shaky equity markets. Zillow expects the monthly home value to rise to 1.8% in March and 2% in April. By February 2023, the average home in the U.S. is expected to be worth nearly $400,000.
The seasonally adjusted annual rate of existing-home sales is expected to come in at 6.36 million for February, up 3.1% year-over-year. As tight supply conditions persist, with an inventory of unsold existing homes of 870,000 as of February, which is equivalent to 1.7 months of supply, housing prices are expected to rise further in the near term.
