Total new-home closings: 8,233
Population: 2,380,314
The good: Year over year, foreclosures are clearing out, along with REO sales.
The bad: New-home sales are under pressure from record-low lot inventories in 2014, as well as some market gains among attached dwellings.
The bottom line: With 964 active subdivisions, there are plenty of opportunities for building, which is proved by a 12% increase in permits year over year in March 2015.
The year 2014 proved dynamic for new-home sales in Charlotte, with all around increases occurring in both starts and closings through the second quarter, when closings registered 19.3% higher year over year. In September, however, new-home closings registered 4.7% lower than the year prior, while October placed even more of a cool down on closings—to the tune of a 15.2% year-over-year decrease. Record-low numbers among available lots, which hit all-time lows in the first half of 2014, fueled those changes to some degree. Combined with shortages in both new and existing homes in 2014, new-home prices moved upward, with September 2014 registering a 12.9% increase year over year. Nonetheless, single-family permits that increased 12% year over year in March 2015 prove that—though a bit volatile—Charlotte’s still moving.
