Pending Home Sales Limped To The End Of 2024

Pending home sales ended the year on a down note, according to data published on Thursday by the National Association of Realtors (NAR). 

Compared to a month prior, contract signings fell 5.5% in December, with the Pending Home Sales Index coming in at a reading of 74.4. An index reading of 100 is equal to the level of contract signings in 2001. 

Annually, pending home sales were down 5.0% compared to a year prior in December. This decrease comes after pending home sales posted monthly gains from August through November. 

“After four straight months of gains in contract signings, one step back is not welcome news, but it is not entirely surprising,” Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief economist, said in a statement. “Economic data never moves in a straight line. High mortgage rates have not significantly dented housing demand due to greater numbers of cash transactions.”

According to Bright MLS chief economist Lisa Sturtevant, 2024 marked a 30-year low for pending home sales. 

“Pending sales activity had been higher in October and November, and there was some growing optimism that the 2025 housing market could start out strong. However, with mortgage rates rising in December and pushing above 7% in January, buyers and sellers are hesitant.

“There remains significant pent-up demand in the housing market, but what could bring more home buyers out in the near-term?” Sturtevant said in a statement. “The most obvious factor that would draw buyers into the market is a drop in mortgage rates. While rates are not expected to drop significantly, short-term dips could cause buyers to get into the market opportunistically.”

Regionally, pending home sales fell in all four regions month over month, dropping 8.1% in the Northeast, 4.9% in the Midwest, 2.7% in the South and 10.3% in the West. Contract sales also fell annually in all four regions, with the Midwest posting the largest year-over-year decrease at 6.9% and the Northeast posting the smallest at 1.3%.