Been Looking to Buy a Home for a While? You're Not the Only One!

If you are in the market for a new home and have been looking for a while without any luck, we know the reason. According to the National Association of Realtors [NAR]'s new report, for the month of August, higher home prices and not enough inventory for sale have kept some would-be buyers at bay.

This is actually the second consecutive month of slow business for realtors.

The only region in the country that saw a monthly increase of home sales is the Northeast -- where there are slightly more available homes for sale.

"While recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau shows that household incomes rose strongly last year, home prices are still outpacing incomes in many metro areas because of the persistent shortage of new and existing homes for sale. Without more supply, the U.S. homeownership rate will remain near 50-year lows," said Lawrence Yun of NAR.

In other words, because there are so few homes on the market right now, their prices are way out of reach for most people.

Speaking of prices, the West led home prices in August with median price-per-home at $347,400 which is almost 10 percent more than the listing prices we saw this same period last year. The most affordable properties are in the Midwest and the South, where the median price of homes is $190,700 and $209,700 respectively.

As we already reported last week, you may want to start looking at Oklahoma and Texas if you are a first time buyer.