Agents Report Strong Homebuyer Traffic Despite Winter Season

Winter weather did not slow down the housing market's momentum, with homebuyer traffic still going strong in December, according to survey results from ""Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance HousingPulse Tracking Survey"":http://www.insidemortgagefinance.com/housing_pulse/.

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The three homebuyer groups--current homeowners, first-time homebuyers, and investors--all recorded their biggest traffic gains of 2012 in December, data from the HousingPulse survey revealed.

""According to our survey respondents, this is not a normal winter. Time on market for non-distressed properties is much lower, and we already see our homebuyer traffic indexes

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building toward a strong spring/summer buying season,"" said Thomas Popik, research director for Campbell Surveys.

The survey also measured the relative health of the housing market by assessing time on market, number of offers, closed transactions, and sales prices. Overall, survey data revealed all measures improved at the end of 2012.

With an index value of 50 representing no change, the sales price index rose month-over-month to 61.1 from 58.1 in November, reaching the highest level recorded by the survey.

The number of offers index jumped to 61.5 in December from 57.3 in November, the highest level since July, HousingPulse reported.

The closed transactions index also trended upwards, rising to 54.4 in December from 51.2 in November.

Meanwhile, time on market improved by falling to 40 in December from 43.3 in November, the lowest level since June.

Survey respondent include about 2,500 real estate agents across the country. When agents in the survey were asked if their local real estate market was experiencing the normal seasonal decline in housing activity, a majority of respondents in December indicated this winter was much busier than normal due to the low inventory of properties for sale and strong homebuyer traffic.