The final 2016 local real estate numbers are in, and nobody will be surprised to hear the industry continues to surge.

The number of units sold, the average price, and total volume locally all increased last year, pointing to continued health in 2017. According to statistics from the Traverse Area Association of Realtors (TAAR), 1,687 single-family homes sold in Grand Traverse County in 2015; 1,765 sold in 2016. In the five-county region, sales grew from 3,088 in 2015 to 3,389 last year, an increase of more than 9.7 percent.

The average home sale price climbed as well, from $240,133 (2015) to $249,319 (2016). That change was even more apparent in Grand Traverse County, where it jumped from $233,439 to $249,288, and in Leelanau County, where it went from $352,681 to $378,940 (average sale prices actually dropped in Benzie ($207,232 to $194,019) and Antrim Counties ($270,146 to $252,127).

Looking back five years, the trend is even more remarkable. The average home in the five-county area now sells for 36 percent more than it did five years ago; the overall home sales volume has grown 116 percent over that span.

Kim Pontius, executive vice president of TAAR, says the statistics demonstrate a high point for the housing industry locally. “This makes the fourth year of year over year new high records, as we surpassed the top-of-the-bubble numbers back in 2012,” he says. “We are one of the hotspots in the state for real estate sales performance.”

Meagan Luce of Century 21 Northland agrees, noting 2016’s brisk sales made last year a seller’s market. “But a seller’s market doesn’t mean you get to pick your price. It means it will sell at the market value. The sky’s not the limit,” she says. “And low inventory is the issue now,” something the data also bears out as more buyers vie for fewer available homes.

Pontius says 2017 projections show a period of stabilization in activity because of inventory shortages and the lack of lower priced housing stock.

On the commercial side, the numbers tell a similar story. Eighty-three commercial properties sold in Grand Traverse County in 2016, up 36 percent from 2015.  Last year also saw the sale of a 110-acre mobile home park on Meadow Lane for $13 million, representing the highest commercial sale ever reported in TAAR.

Eliminating that outlier in the data, the average commercial sale price was $401,721, still 32 percent higher than in 2015.

Dan Stiebel of Coldwell Banker Schmidt Realtors says last year also signaled a return to strong sales of development property. Over the past ten years, those sales had all but disappeared.

“From 2008 to 2014, people were not looking at land. There were no sales. Now there are more on the market because they can sell for the value of the land as development increases,” he says. “The market is looking good. There is more vacant land and more buyers.”