Low rates of interest spur sales of homes.

Byline: From Register-Guard and news service reports

Spurred by continued low interest rates, Lane County's residential real estate market hummed along in October, according to data compiled by RMLS, the multiple listing service used by real estate agents in the county.

Here's a look at the numbers:

Closed sales hit 436 for the month, up 12.7 percent from October 2002. The 389 pending sales in October represented a 9 percent drop from the 428 pending sales in the same period a year ago.

The median sales price for homes in October was $148,000, up $100 from October 2002. The median has the same number of sales above and below it.

The average home sales price for the month hit $168,400, up from the $161,500 recorded in October 2002.

For the first 10 months of the year, closed sales are up 8.2 percent, pending sales are up 2.3 percent and new listings are down by 5.4 percent.

In October, homes spent an average of 59 days on the market, down from 65 days last year.

The RMLS data include all sales of homes - both existing and newly built - that were marketed via the listing service.

Nationally, sales of previously owned homes eased in October to the third-strongest on record, powered by cheap financing and an improving job market, an industry report showed.

Existing home sales totaled 6.35 million at an annual pace last month, down from the best-ever annual rate of 6.68 million in September, the National Association of Realtors said in Washington. A record 5.99 million existing homes will be sold this year, the association forecasts.

Average 30-year fixed mortgage rates dropped last month from September and were less than one percentage point above the record low reached in June, keeping houses affordable, Bloomberg News reported.

A brightening of the job market is boosting consumer confidence, and companies such as Home Depot Inc. and Williams-Sonoma Inc. report sales gains as homeowners invest in improvements, the news agency reported.

``We continue to be as optimistic as we have been,'' said Richard Smith, chairman and chief executive of Cendant Corp.'s real estate services division. Cendant, based in New York, is involved in one out of every four home sales through its NRT Inc., the largest owner of U.S. brokerages, and through Cendant's franchising of the Coldwell Banker, Century 21 and ERA brands. ``It's an extraordinary year by any stretch of the imagination,'' Smith said.

A record 5.57 million existing homes were sold in 2002. Existing homes account for 85 percent of the residential real estate market and new homes the remainder.