Area home sales rise - first time since Jan. '07

By Jamie Smith Hopkins

Home sales in the Baltimore metro area rose last month for the first time since January 2007, numbers released Friday morning show.

Residents sold 2,375 homes last month, up 2 percent from a year earlier, according to multiple-listing service Metropolitan Regional Information Systems. Every jurisdiction in the metro area saw an increase except Baltimore, where sales slipped 1 percent -- still a big improvement over the month before.

Average prices continued to fall, down 10 percent across the metro area.