Home Sales Data Doubted, Realtor Group May Have Overstated Number of Existing Houses Sold

The number of home sales may have been counted incorrectly over the past few years by the National Association of Realtors says CoreLogic, a real estate analytics group in California. CoreLogic has stated that NAR’s reported number of home sales may be off by as much as 20 percent. This finding would not change the numbers associated with pricing, but would be substantially different regarding the inventory that is in limbo. If the number is that much higher, then moving those homes from inventory to market will take much longer than recently estimated. NAR says it is looking carefully at this and may need to revise the numbers this summer. The reporting problem was likely due to difficulties with tracking data.

SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, 2/22/11

URL: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704476604576158452087956150.html