SARASOTA, Fla. (June 22, 2023) – Despite the persistence of higher home prices and interest rates, buyer demand is still present in the Sarasota and Manatee housing market. According to data from Florida REALTORS® and compiled by the REALTOR® Association of Sarasota and Manatee (RASM), May 2023 showed an ongoing rise in the month’s supply of inventory accompanied by an increase in the time it took properties to go under contract.
REALTORS® in the North Port-Sarasota-Bradenton MSA participated in 2,422 sales in May (combined for single-family homes and condos), a 1.8 percent decrease from the same month last year. In Manatee County, closed sales increased from last year for both property types, while Sarasota County sales decreased from May 2022.
Single-family closed sales in Manatee increased year-over-year by 17.2 percent to 803 sales, the largest number of Manatee closed sales reported in one month since June of 2021. For Manatee condos, closed sales increased by five percent to 356 sales. In Sarasota County, single-family closed sales decreased year-over-year by 9.7 percent to 822 sales while condo sales decreased by 17.1 percent to 441 sales.
Pending sales, or the number of homes that went under contract last month, decreased across all markets except for single-family homes in Manatee County. For single-family homes, pending sales increased year-over-year by 17.1 percent in Manatee County, but decreased by 18.1 percent in Sarasota. In the condo market, pending sales decreased by 7.1 percent in Manatee and by 13.3 percent in Sarasota.
“In the ever-changing real estate landscape of Sarasota and Manatee, we are seeing a balance between slight upward and downward trends across most of the metrics we measure, leading to what many would call a stable market,” said Brian Tresidder, 2023 RASM President and Strategic Growth & Sales Manager at Willian Raveis Real Estate. “Manatee County’s single-family homes witnessed their highest number of closed sales in one month since June of 2021, which shows us that with high home values and higher interest rates, there is still buyer demand in our area.”
Median prices in the North Port-Sarasota-Bradenton MSA experienced a decline for single-family homes while condo prices increased slightly from the previous month and from the previous year. Condo prices increased by 3.4 percent to $382,645 in Manatee County and by 0.5 percent to $405,000 in Sarasota County. For single-family homes, the median price in Manatee decreased by 6.4 percent to $515,000 while the price in Sarasota increased by three percent to $510,000.
The month’s supply of inventory continues to increase across the two counties this month. In Manatee County, single-family home supply increased by 125 percent to a 2.7-month supply and condo supply increased by 240 percent to a 3.4-month supply. In Sarasota County, there was a 3-month supply for single-family homes and a 3.5-month supply for condos, a year-over-year increase of 150 percent and 250 percent respectively.
“As the month’s supply of housing inventory still hovers around three months, we remain firmly in a seller’s market,” said Tresidder. “We saw a noteworthy decline in the number of new listings in May of 2023 compared to May of 2022, which will slow the trend of moving toward a more balanced market.”
At the end of the month, there were 5,195 active listings combined for both property types in the North Port-Sarasota-Bradenton MSA, a 103.3 percent increase from the same time last year and a 1.1 percent decrease when compared to last month. Broken down for each property type, there were 3,348 active listings reported for single-family homes and 1,847 listings reported in the condo market at the end of May.
The median number of days from listing date to contract date increased year-over-year and month-over-month in May. Manatee County single-family homes went under contract within a median of 32 days, a year-over-year increase of 433.3 percent. For Manatee condos, the median time to contract was 37 days in May, a 516.7 percent increase from the same month last year. In Sarasota, the median time to contract for single-family homes increased by 316.7 percent to 25 days and condos increased by 440 percent to 27 days.