After reporting a sharp pullback in U.S. new home sales in the previous month, the Commerce Department released a report on Wednesday showing that new home sales rebounded in October.
The report said new home sales jumped 10.7 percent to an annual rate of 495,000 in October after slumping 12.9 percent to a revised 447,000 in September.
Economists had expected new home sales to climb to a rate of 499,000 from the 468,000 originally reported for the previous month.
With the monthly rebound, the Commerce Department said new home sales in October were up by 4.9 percent compared to the same month a year ago.
The bounce back in new home sales was partly due to a sharp jump in sales in the Northeast, which surged up by 135.3 percent to a rate of 40,000.
New home sales in the South and Midwest also climbed by 8.9 percent and 5.3 percent, respectively, while new home sales in the West edged down by 0.9 percent.
Meanwhile, the report said the median sales price of new houses sold in October was $281,500, down 8.5 percent from $307,800 in September and down 6 percent from $299,400 a year ago.
The Commerce Department also said there were 226,000 new houses for sale at the end of October, representing 5.5 months of supply at the current sales rate. There was 6.0 months of supply in September.
On Monday, the National Association of Realtors released a separate report showing that existing home sales pulled back by a little more than expected in October.
NAR said existing home sales fell 3.4 percent to an annual rate of 5.36 million in October after surging up 4.7 percent to a rate of 5.55 million in September. Economists had expected sales to drop to a rate of 5.40 million.
The material has been provided by InstaForex Company – www.instaforex.com