2020 will always be remembered as the year of the pandemic, and its impact on the economy has been crushing. But while COVID-19 brought the real estate market nearly to a halt earlier this year, it certainly has come roaring back.

Residential sales in September topped all previous records, with every county posting new all-time highs in both dollar volume and the number of sales, with only two exceptions: Kalkaska County’s 29 sales were topped in 2019, 2018 and 2013, though its dollar volume of $5,311,400 stands as its high water mark. Benzie County’s 49 home sales for $13,543,000 was bested in 2017 when the county saw 65 home sales for $13,904,950, but the average sale price jumped to a high of $276,387, far more than last year’s $226,606 or the previous high of $265,556 in September 2014.

The biggest gains came in Leelanau County, where its total of $42,437,650 on sales of 89 homes is also far above its previous record totals. Overall, the five-county real estate sales for last month totaled $151,270,406 on sales of 423 homes. That is nearly $47 million more than the previous high of $104,504,358 in September 2018.

Sales for the first three quarters of the year also demonstrate the strength with which the market returned following the reopening of the economy. While the total of residential sales still lags behind previous years – there have been 2,338 sales this year, compared with 2,446 in 2019, 2,475 in 2017 and 2,478 in 2016 – the $780,473,999 this year outstrips the previous high set last year of $739,895,495. Another key indicator is the way sales of vacant land have rebounded, with this year’s total of 761 units for $71,995,617 topping all previous records.