NEW YORK - Pending home sales slipped 2.8% to a reading of 88.9 in January, according to a report released Thursday by the National Association of Realtors.
Economists polled by Thomson Reuters predicted a 2.2% increase for the index.
The December index was revised to a 91.5 reading, originally reported as 93.7
Year-over-year the pending homes sales index was down 1.5% from last January, when the index was 90.3.
Regionally, pending sales were mixed. The Northeast saw a 2.4% decrease to 73.5, while sales rose 1.4% to 97.7 in the South and decreased 7.3% in the Midwest to 78.0. Sales dropped 5.2% to 98.7 in the West.
“The housing market is healing with sales fluctuating at times, depending on the flow of distressed properties coming on the market,” NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun said. “In the past two years, home buyers have been very successful, with super-low loan default rates, partly because of stable home prices during that time. That trend is likely to continue in 2011 as long as there is sufficient demand to absorb inventory. We should not expect the recovery to be in a straight upward path – it will zig-zag at times,” he said.
