U.S. New Home Sales Surge Much More Than Expected In March

(RTTNews) - New home sales in the U.S. surged by much more than expected in the month of March, according to a report released by the Commerce Department on Wednesday.

The Commerce Department said new home sales spiked by 7.4 percent to an annual rate of 724,000 in March after jumping by 3.1 percent to a revised rate of 674,000 in February.

Economists had expected new home sales to climb by 0.9 percent to a rate of 682,000 from the 676,000 originally reported for the previous month.

With the much bigger than expected increase, new home sales reached their highest level since hitting an annual rate of 726,000 last September.

New home sales in the South led the way higher, soaring by 13.6 percent to an annual rate of 483,000. The report said new home sales in the Midwest also shot up by 3.0 percent to an annual rate of 69,000.

Meanwhile, new home sales in the West slumped by 1.4 percent to an annual rate of 144,000, and new home sales in the Northeast plunged by 22.2 percent to an annual rate of 28,000.

The Commerce Department also said the estimate of new houses for sale at the end of March was 503,000, up 0.6 percent from 500,000 in February and up 7.9 percent from 460,000 a year ago.

The estimate of new houses for sale represents 8.3 months of supply at the current sales rate, down from 8.9 months in February but up from 8.2 months in March 2024.

The median sales price of new houses sold in March was $403,600, down 1.9 percent from $411,500 in February and down 7.5 percent from $436,400 a year ago.

On Friday, the National Association of Realtors is scheduled to release a separate report on existing home sales in the month of March.

Economists currently expect existing home sales to tumble by 3.1 percent to an annual rate of 4.13 million in March after surging by 4.2 percent to an annual rate of 4.26 million in February.