Sales and Prices of Bay State Homes and Condos On the Rise

April marked yet another month of improvement for the residential real estate market in Massachusetts. According[IMAGE]

to a recent report released by ""the Warren Group"":http://www.thewarrengroup.com/portal/Default.aspx, a provider of real estate data in New England, the Bay State saw year-over-year increases in both sales and prices of single-family homes and condos in April.

Soaring 45.8 percent from one year earlier, a total of 3,980 single-family homes were sold in Massachusetts in April. This, the Warren Group said, was the most sales for the month of April in five years. Furthermore, year-to-date homes sales were up 26.1 percent.

[COLUMN_BREAK]

In addition, the statewide median price for single-family homes sold in April was $285,000, up 7.1 percent from April 2009. And the median home price for the first four months of this year was up 8.1 percent.

""The surge in sales activity continued in April. Single-family home sales have increased year-over-year for 10 straight months, and median home prices have been on the rise for five months,"" said Timothy M. Warren Jr., CEO of The Warren Group. ""There is more confidence about a turnaround in the housing market, but concerns remain about foreclosure activity and unemployment, which are still high.""

According to the Warren Group, the trend of increasing sales and prices was also observed in the Bay State's condo market.

Condo sales in Massachusetts, which totaled 1,831 transactions in April, jumped 56 percent compared to a year ago. Additionally, condo sales for the first four months of this year were up 32.6 percent.

The same was true for condo prices. With a median price of $253,000 in April, Bay State condo prices inched up 5.5 percent from the same month last year. And the year-to-date median condo price rose 8.7 percent.