Area homes ‘affordable’ as prices rise nationwide

Dayton-area and Ohio home prices remain relatively affordable even as home prices rise nationally, according to an organization that sifts real estate data.

“Ohio continues to be a very affordable housing market, even though we are seeing an overall statewide increase in housing prices,” said Matthew Watercutter, senior regional vice president and broker of record for HER Realtors, covering Dayton, Columbus and Cincinnati in Ohio.

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Watercutter was quoted in a statement from ATTOM Data Solutions, which describes itself as the “curator of the nation’s largest multi-sourced property database.”

According to the Dayton Area Board of Realtors, the median sales price of Dayton-area homes in May came in at $133,950, slightly above the May 2016 median by just less than one percent.

The average sale price of $157,488, meanwhile, was four percent better than last year, the board said.

According to a new ATTOM report on U.S. home affordability, the U.S. median home price of $253,000 in the second quarter of 2017 was at the “least affordable” level since the third quarter of 2008, a nearly nine-year low in affordability.

“While home price appreciation in the second quarter accelerated to the fastest pace in more than three years, wage growth turned negative, posting the biggest year-over-year decrease in five years in Q4 2016 — the most recent average weekly wage data available,” Daren Blomquist, senior vice president at ATTOM Data Solutions, said in his company’s report.

Median home prices in the second quarter this year grew at a faster annual pace than average weekly wages in 403 of the 464 counties analyzed in the report, ATTOM said.

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