Single-family contracts continued the downward trend in September, falling to 497 for the month. Through nine months of 2011, we remain on pace to finish the year slightly ahead of 2010 but behind the 2009 total.
There was a lot of interest in our markets at the beginning of September; it was a noticeable increase from the end of August and much of the summer. The rest of the month seemed pretty active too, so I’m a bit surprised to see the number of contracts come in at a lower level than August, though 35 deals (532 in August versus 497 in September) isn’t a huge number.
Looking a little deeper at last month versus this month, it appears that two towns experienced major slowdowns that nearly equal the total for the County. The number of contracts accepted in Southington decreased by 15 deals from August, while Windsor decreased by 13. Other towns also saw a less active September, but not by such a wide margin. Manchester, East Hartford, and Marborough reported decreases in the number of contracts of 8, 7, and 6 respectively. On the other side of the ledger, the town Bristol was up 7 deals and Glastonbury was up 6 deals.
Each town is its own market, and this is yet another example of how the data can vary. Below is the year over year comparison for each town in the County, showing a 12% increase in activity for September 2011 over the same month in 2010.
