Wisconsin Home Sales Set Record For Third Straight Year

New figures show 2017 was the third straight year of record home sales in Wisconsin.

The latest report from Wisconsin Realtors Association shows more than 83,000 home sales last year.

That was a 1.4 percent increase from the record sales in 2016, despite a decline in the number of houses on the market.

Marquette University economist David Clark said supply remains the biggest challenge for Wisconsin’s real estate market.

“There’s just not a lot of homes out there to sell,” he said. “And if we don’t start seeing some upward movement in that, you can’t continue to be able to sustain that level of demand.”

Low supply and strong demand pushed home prices higher last year.

The median price of a single-family home stood at $174,000 at the end of 2017.

Clark said he expects supply to increase over the next few years, as older homeowners put their properties up for sale and homebuilders respond to the continued high demand.

“Builders who perhaps shifted to remodeling activity when the economy turned south can actually shift their activity toward new construction at this point in time because there’s relatively strong demand for new homes,” he said.

But until the state sees more housing inventory, Clark said, Wisconsin homes will likely become less affordable.