Home sales fell in February for some parts of the region, according to the latest statistics. 

Brunswick, Pender and New Hanover counties combined saw a nearly 8 percent decline in the number of units sold, including single-family homes, condos, manufactured homes and townhomes, falling from 692 to 637, stated a Cape Fear Realtors report on the organization's website. 

Regionwide, the average home sale price was up to nearly $293,000 (from about $284,000 in February 2018), and pending sales were also on the rise in February compared to the same month last year, the report showed.

Those signs, along with a decrease in both the median days on market and months of supply for the tri-county area, "are indicative of a very strong market," said Sherri Pridgen, this year's president of CFR and a Realtor/broker with Coldwell Banker Sea Coast Advantage.

"I'm looking forward to a great spring and summer sesason," Pridgen said.

In Brunswick County alone, the number of homes sold fell by 13.6 percent, from 301 in February 2018 to 260 in February this year, according to a news release from the Brunswick County Association of Realtors.

The average sale price, however, increased in Brunswick compared to both February 2018 and January 2019. The year-over-year difference was 4.4 percent, rising from $258,833 in February 2018 to $270,187 last month, the release stated.
 
“February is typically known as our warm-up month, and this year is no exception,” said BCAR CEO Cynthia Walsh in the release. “Brunswick County’s residential real estate market is in solid shape moving into spring, with sale prices on the rise and a tight inventory of available homes. All signs point to another strong spring and summer.”
 
The number of new listings in Brunswick increased 2.2 percent last month compared to the same month last year, rising from 554 to 566, the BCAR data showed. The total sales volume for the county fell nearly 10 percent, from $77.91 million to $70.25 million.

"The absorption rate, which measures how long it would take to sell the current inventory of homes, is at 4.75 months, a slight increase from 4.4 last month," the  BCAR release stated. "The average number of days on market continues to hover in the three-month range."

The number of homes sold in New Hanover County was exactly the same at 305 in February 2018 and February 2019, the CFR report stated, while Pender County experienced a 16.5 percent decline, from 85 to 71 homes sold.

Meanwhile, the average sale price continued to rise in New Hanover, reaching more than $313,000, while the average sale price in Pender was nearly $276,000, the CFR numbers showed.