Overall residential home sales has dropped by over 19% in March when compared to the previous year’s activity, according to stats released by a regional multiple listing service. OneKey MLS, a new regional listing organization, created by the Long Island Board of REALTORS, Inc. (LIBOR) and the Hudson Gateway Association of REALTORS, Inc. (HGAR), combined stats include sales and contracts from Queens, Nassau, and Suffolk Counties.

 

In March, 2,220 houses were sold, when compared to 2,636 in February, a 15.78% drop, and a 19.27% drop from March 2019. Homes that went into contract dropped by 2.73% between March and February 2020 and represents a 14.89% drop from the year before.

 

Broken out by county in March 2020, in Nassau, home sales dropped by 19.4%, while in Suffolk sales dropped by 16.6%.

 

On the bright side, overall home prices still inched up in the area. The median home price was at $490,000 a 2.30% increase from February and 6.52% increase from the previous year.

 

In Suffolk the median sold home price was $405,000 this March compared to $370,000 last year, a 9.5% increase. Nassau County had a less impressive increase in sold median home prices but actual values were much higher than in Suffolk. This year the median home price in Nassau was $530,000 in March 2020 compared to $515,000 last year, a 2.9% increase.

 

A statement released by OneKey MLS said that they believed that housing indicators for March 2020 have been impacted by COVID-19 and “has significantly reduced real estate business practices across our entire region.”

 

“Naturally, a crisis of this magnitude would have a downward impact on the number of new listings and monthly sales activity,” they said in the statement.