The cities of Greensboro, High Point and Guilford County issued a shelter-in-place order that went into effect at 5:00 p.m. on Friday March 27. This order deemed Real Estate sales as a non-essential service and forbade agents from showing homes or conducting open houses.

The stay-at-home order will obviously affect sales. But because the order occurred so late in the month it is too soon to tell what exactly it will mean for our local real estate market. The charts below show the last three year’s numbers for the following metrics in Guilford County: average sales price, number of new listings, closed sales, days on the market and months supply. The changes for average sales prices, new listings, days on market and months supply of homes look much like they did in March 2019. Average sales prices continue to climb and inventory is increasingly scarcer. The one metric that is showing the early strains in the market is the number of closed sales. March 2019 saw a year over year increase of 3.8% while we actually saw the number of closings decline 0.3% this year. Year to date closed sales volume is up 5.7% and the last 12 months closing volume was up 5.2%. March’s 2020 number is almost a six point reversal of what had been a steady growth trend. We have essentially slammed on the brakes. April numbers will give us a much better idea of the short term impact to the market. Check back every month for the latest on your local real estate market.