The latest report from the National Association of Realtors is reporting that existing-home sales were down in month of August by 2.2 percent.

The reason for this slight stall? NAR President Richard F. Gaylord, a broker with RE/MAX Real Estate Specialists in Long Beach, Calif., said the pendulum in the mortgage market has swung too far. "The difficulty in obtaining a mortgage increased over past couple months, making it more challenging for creditworthy borrowers to find financing," he said. "Our hope is that overly tight lending criteria can be loosened with reasonable standards and credit so that sales activity can catch up with demand. Interest rates have already declined, but there is a serious question as to whether a cash infusion by the U.S. Treasury into Wall Street would help consumers by improving mortgage funding."

Regionally, the Midwest and South still both saw small increases, with the west seeing nearly a 1 percent gain month over month.

These gains, however, still don't put the regions back into the pace seen in 2007. The Midwest, for example, is still 12.3 percent below the existing-sales pace of last year.

Existing-home sales weren't the only statistic to show a drop. The national median existing-home price fell as well to $203,100. This is 9.5 percent below last year.

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Published: September 25, 2008

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