REALTORS SEE PICKUP IN SALES

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, January 3, 1992                   TAG: 9201030103
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short
REALTORS SEE PICKUP IN SALES
Sales of houses in the Roanoke Valley were off 25 percent last year, but there still were signs of a pickup in the market in the final quarter of the year.
In 1991, sales totaled 2,503 homes, down from 3,349 in 1990, the Roanoke Valley Association of Realtors reported Thursday. The total for the fourth quarter, however, was only nine transactions below that of the final quarter of 1990.
Fourth-quarter totals fell much more drastically from 1989 to 1990 - 122 - and from 1988 to 1989 - 119 - according to figures from the Realtors' Multiple Listing Service.
There were only two months during 1991, April and October, in which sales exceeded that month for the previous year. Frances Bridge, spokeswoman for the realty group, said she was heartened by the increase in April from the year before and thought it might be the signal of a turnaround.
That hope ended, she said, when sales in May and June dropped well below the 1990 totals.
On Thursday, she said she read the last-quarter figures with optimism, however, and believed the small drop from 1990 indicates a turnaround in the decline in home sales.
The 123 sales in December represented a dollar volume of $12.4 million. Eighty sales were of homes under $100,000, 33 were in the $100,000-to-$200,000 range, eight were in the $200,000-$300,000 range and two were for more than $300,000.
The median price for the month was $79,950.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB