By Catherine Reagor
The Arizona Republic
For the past five years, tens of thousands of homeowners have been frozen in place, unable to sell their homes for a profit.
Now, there are signs a thaw is under way.
Sales by owners who are not facing foreclosure or a distressed sale are on the increase again, a trend that real-estate analysts and agents say points to a fuller housing-market recovery eagerly awaited but still in the early stages.
Also, foreclosures and short sales, which have dominated the market and dragged down metro Phoenix’s home prices since the crash, have been slowing steadily this year.
Profits made by regular sellers haven’t been huge so far, but they have risen with the region’s 35 percent increase in median home prices over the past year. More people who have owned their homes a long time find they can sell and make a satisfactory profit. More who bought near the height of the boom are no longer underwater, meaning they now owe less than what their house is worth.
In August, the median price of a regular home sale in metro Phoenix climbed slightly to $185,000, about $30,000 more than the median for all sales, according to new data from Arizona State University’s College of Business.
Last month, the number of regular resales, or homes sold by an owner without lender aid, was 81 percent higher than the same month a year earlier.
