Austin home prices continue climbing in November as supply remains limited

From January through November, the number of home sales in the city of Austin was roughly equal to sales in the same period in 2019. After a significant dip in spring, sales rebounded late in the year, and the 11,534 sales in 2020 through November within the city was a 0.3% increase over 2019, according to the latest data from the Austin Board of Realtors.

Sale prices tell a different story, as Realtors say constrained supply has driven housing prices higher and higher. In Austin, the median sale price of a home in 2020 through November was $417,000, an 11.2% increase over 2019.

That trend is even more pronounced in the center of the city—within Community Impact Newspaper's Central Austin circulation area, the $565,000 median price in the first 11 months of 2020 is up 15.3% over the previous year. Meanwhile, the 3,710 sales in Central Austin through November 2020 are down 1.1% from 2019.

ABoR president Romeo Manzanilla said in a media release while the housing market is strong, the ever-shrinking supply of homes is a serious hurdle.

"This near-zero level of housing inventory throughout the region is staggering, and it will put enormous pressure on home prices and the rental market,” Manzanilla said in the release.

In the metro area as a whole, the same trend is at play, although some suburban areas have seen significantly higher areas of growth. Community Impact Newspaper's circulation areas in Georgetown, Lake Travis-Westlake and San Marcos-Buda-Kyle have all seen double-digit percentage increases in home sales through November 2020, with median sale prices also up.

“With a steady influx of job creation in the pipeline, the housing market will continue to post strong numbers well into 2021,” Mark Sprague, state director of information capital at Independence Title, said in the release. “But, because Austin’s housing market is not slowing down, we will continue to see demand outpace the inventory available. This growth is not sustainable. The one variable that will hold the market back is the lack of inventory.”