PEABODY — Single-family home sales in most North Shore communities fell for the first nine months of the year, but buyers won’t find any discounts, according to new data from The Warren Group, the Peabody real-estate tracker.
While sales slumped in Lynn, Lynnfield, Nahant, Peabody, and Swampscott, prices continued their upward climb to the stratosphere.
Brokers say too few homes for sale, out-of-sight prices in Boston’s downtown neighborhoods, and once-affordable places like Somerville, Chelsea and Everett, have sent buyers north seeking alternatives.
In Lynn, home sales fell by 3 percent from January through September. As sales dipped in Lynn, the median price of a single-family home rose by 7 percent to $370,000, up from $345,000 for the same period last year.
In July, Lynn’s median price hit $377,000, the highest recorded price in the city since The Warren Group began keeping records more than 30 years ago.
In Lynnfield, the number of single-family home sales has declined by 8 percent since January. During that period, prices rose by 2 percent, putting the median price at $675,000.
Nahant home sales have fallen by 37 percent this year compared to 2018 as median prices climbed to $552,500, a 16 percent hike.
It was no different in Peabody where sales dipped by 12 percent since January as prices rose 1 percent to $442,000.
In Swampscott, sales have slipped by 8 percent while prices rose to $590,000, a 2 percent increase over a year ago.
The same trend was seen statewide for the first nine months of the year. There have been 44,291 single-family home sales so far in 2019, a nearly 2 percent decrease from the first nine months of 2018. But the median sale price has reached $400,000, a 3 percent increase over a year ago.
The outlier was Saugus, where sales swelled by 12 percent this year over last while the median price for a single-family home increased by 1 percent to $458,000.
