All-cash sales are on the decline, accounting for 32.4 percent of total home sales in November 2016, down 4.5 percentage points year over year, according to CoreLogic's most recent housing data. That's a significant drop from January 2011, when cash sales were at their peak: a whopping 46.6 percent of all home sales nationally. CoreLogic experts predict cash sales will fall to a historical norm of about 25 percent by mid-2017.
Cash sales are most common in the REO market (60.2 percent of REO sales were cash in November 2016), followed by resale homes (32.3 percent), short sales (31.9 percent), and newly constructed homes (15.5 percent), according to CoreLogic. REO sales have been steadily declining since their peak in January 2011, which helps explain the overall drop in cash sales.
The state with the largest number of cash sales in November was New York, at 47.4 percent of transactions, according to CoreLogic. Other states with elevated percentages of cash sales include Alabama (47.3 percent), Michigan (44.1 percent), Florida (42.4 percent), and Indiana (41 percent).
Source: “Cash and Distressed Sales Update: November 2016,” CoreLogic Insights Blog (Feb. 27, 2017)
