“It is incredibly thin right now,” Jack Kreider, executive vice president and regional director of RE/MAX Northern Illinois, tells GlobeSt.com. However, “it was good to see those home values make real strides toward recovery in April. The buyers are there, and we hope that as the market gets stronger it will draw in more sellers.”

The average time a home sold in April spent on the market before finding a buyer was 99 days, the data show, down from 105 days a year earlier. “We are seeing many listings get multiple offers and selling quickly,” says Johnson. Still, despite the impressive gains, home prices in many areas remain below the heights seen before the collapse, and many potential sellers have chosen to hold their properties and wait for better days.

The RE/MAX analysis is based on home sales data for the counties of Cook, DuPage, Kane, Kendall, Lake, McHenry and Will collected by MRED, the regional multiple listing service.

Another heartening development in April was that the percentage of total home sales involving foreclosures and short sales fell to 16.3%, the lowest level since RE/MAX began tracking these distressed sales in 2009.

CHICAGO—After a winter of modest sales, the Chicago-area housing market bloomed with the arrival of spring, according to the latest analysis by RE/MAX. In the seven-county metro area, both the number of homes sold and the median home sales price were about 10% higher than in April 2015. Sales totaled 10,125 units, and the median price was $230,500.

“The collar counties as a whole put up great numbers,” Stephen Johnson, marketing communications manager for RE/MAX Northern Illinois, tells GlobeSt.com. McHenry County was a particular stand-out, with 429 sales of detached homes, an increase of 26% over last April and the biggest jump of any county.

He adds that March was a bit of a soft month due to adverse weather, and this partly explains why some areas saw a big leap in sales. Other big gains in sales, both attached and detached, were found in Kendall County (up 18%), Lake (up 20%), McHenry (up 19%) and Will (up 14%). Sales were up 9% in DuPage, 8% in Cook, and 7% in Kane, as well as 9% in Chicago.

One thing that has been constant in the market for some time is the decline in the inventory of homes for sale. In April, this totaled 34,641 at month's end, 9% less than at the same time last year, according to RE/MAX. Based on the pace of April sales, that inventory represents less than a four-month supply of homes.

“It is incredibly thin right now,” Jack Kreider, executive vice president and regional director of RE/MAX Northern Illinois, tells GlobeSt.com. However, “it was good to see those home values make real strides toward recovery in April. The buyers are there, and we hope that as the market gets stronger it will draw in more sellers.”

The average time a home sold in April spent on the market before finding a buyer was 99 days, the data show, down from 105 days a year earlier. “We are seeing many listings get multiple offers and selling quickly,” says Johnson. Still, despite the impressive gains, home prices in many areas remain below the heights seen before the collapse, and many potential sellers have chosen to hold their properties and wait for better days.

The RE/MAX analysis is based on home sales data for the counties of Cook, DuPage, Kane, Kendall, Lake, McHenry and Will collected by MRED, the regional multiple listing service.

Another heartening development in April was that the percentage of total home sales involving foreclosures and short sales fell to 16.3%, the lowest level since RE/MAX began tracking these distressed sales in 2009.