Houston, Texas may be thick around the middle, but a lot of people want to order what the Houstonites are having. Home sales are up, says the Houston Association of Realtors, to record levels.

In 2004, Houston sold more than $12 billion worth of properties and recorded the highest annual single-family home average sales price.

It was embarrassing when Men's Fitness magazine named Houston America's Fattest City in 2003, but since then the city has done some slimming down. In 2004, Detroit became America's Fattest City while Houston was named number two. Dallas rolled up from number nine to number three. The fattest cities are "fat" due to factors such as too many fast-food restaurants and too much time driving instead. Cities are chided by the magazine to do a better job creating walkable communities, and to encourage and reward city employees and citizens for time spent on treadmills and pedestrian-friendly walkways.

Houston's made progress, but statistically speaking, how fat it is may not have a lot to do with how popular it is as a city. All local Realtors know is that Houston's doing something right because a lot of people surely want to live there.

The real estate market ended 2004 with the best year in the history of the city, according to statistics released by the Houston Association of Realtors^® Multiple Listing Service.

New annual records were set for total dollar volume of transactions, number of properties sold and average sales price. More than 72,000 properties, or an average of 6,000 per month, changed hands through the MLS during 2004, which was an increase of 10.1 percent versus last year. The Houston housing market outpaced the overall 2004 national average increase in existing home sales of 8.9 percent, according to estimates by the National Association of Realtors ^®. Additionally, more than $12 billion worth of property, or an average of $1 billion per month, was transacted in the Houston area in 2004, which was an increase of 7.6 percent from 2003 levels.

"This has been the best year in Houston that residential real estate has ever seen and current economic indicators project 2005 to be just as strong," said Toni Nelson, HAR Chair and a Division Vice President for Coldwell Banker United, Realtors^®. "We are fortunate to live in a city that has experienced stable growth over a number of years with no economic indicators that point to either a boom or a bust, as in some areas of the country. We can have confidence in the retention of our homes' values."

For the full-year 2004 Houston housing market, it was another record-breaking year that continued its show of strength that has been sustained since 1992. As previously mentioned, property sales were up 10.1 percent for the year, while total dollar volume of properties sold was up 13.8 percent. The average sales price for a single-family home in 2004 was $178,196, or a 1.8 percent increase on a year-over-year basis, with the median single-family home price of $135,000 remaining unchanged from 2003.

While the overall median price of single-family homes reached $138,000 in December, which was an increase of 1.5 percent compared to the prior year, the median price for existing homes in 2004 was up 4.5 percent versus the previous 12 months.

These figures signal sustained pricing strength in Houston, says the HAR, particularly in the home resale market.

Houston's current median price of $138,000 is 26.7 percent less than the national median price, which reached $188,200 in November, according to statistics released by the National Association of Realtors. These data continue to show the tremendous value and lower cost of living afforded to Houstonians, says the HAR.