Dayton-area home sales climbed 17.6 percent in February from the same month last year as low mortgage rates, better loan availability and reasonable prices drew buyers into the market, industry experts said.

“We’re in an upswing,” said real estate agent Nancy Farkas of Coldwell Banker Heritage Realtors.

The year is starting strong. January and February each had their best months since 2007 for number of homes sold, according to the Dayton Area Board of Realtors.

The realtors’ association said Thursday that 807 single family homes and condominiums were sold in the area last month, up 17.6 percent year-over-year from February 2012 sales of 686 homes. In February 2007, 920 homes were sold.

The Dayton area includes Montgomery, Greene and Preble counties and part of Warren County.

The average sale price grew as well, while the inventory of homes listed for sale continued to shrink. The average sale price in February grew 4.6 percent to $111,472. A year ago it was $106,542, according to the association.

February ended with an inventory of 6,305 homes for sale, which is considered a 7.8 month supply. That’s down from 7,242 homes listed on the market the same time a year earlier, which was then a 10.5 month supply.

Low interest rates and prices and loosening credit restrictions “are combining to make home affordability at record highs,” said Jim Russell, senior equity analyst of The Private Client Reserve of U.S. Bank, the bank’s wealth management arm.

The conditions are driving homebuyers to take action now before prices pick back up, said Farkas, who’s also the realtors’ association president this year.

Interest rates averaged 3.53 percent nationally in February for a fixed 30-year mortgage, up from 3.41 percent in January. But rates are still below the average 4.99 percent it was in February 2010, according to the Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey.

“I think everybody’s trying to get on this before it changes,” Farkas said. “Now things are balanced. In some areas it’s become a short supply of inventory,” she said.

“When you’re in oversupply, it’s a buyer’s market. If you get to an undersupply, it’s a seller’s market. We’re not there yet in terms of being in an undersupply situation, but it looks like we could be heading there in certain areas of town,” she said.

Economists with PNC Financial Services Group expect the housing market recovery will further strengthen this year, thanks to record-low mortgage rates from expansionary monetary policy, according to the bank’s most recent national economic outlook.

Federal Reserve Board policy has been to buy U.S. treasury debt and mortgage debt to keep interest rates low and stimulate the economy as long as unemployment levels remain high.

The overall economy and housing market are closely intertwined, Russell said.

“We think one of the things driving housing is an increased sense that we’re through the worst,” Russell said. “It is a reinforcing mechanism because for most people, 60 percent, houses are their biggest financial asset and it’s stopped losing value.”

Unemployment rates for the Dayton metro area stand at 8.7 percent, still not considered healthy, but below past levels that reached as high as 12.4 percent, according to Ohio Department of Job and Family Services labor figures.

The wealth effect of increasing home values bolsters consumer spending and the rest of the economy, experts say.

“We do not feel like this is a flash in the pan,” Russell said.

Statewide, preliminary estimates show that 7,360 sales of single family homes and condominiums closed last month, up 10 percent from February 2012 home sales of 6,680 units, said Ohio Association of Realtors. The February Ohio average sale price was approximately $125,000 compared to $115,930 a year ago.