Last month, the nine-county area that includes the city of Chicago showed a notable improvement in homes sales from July of last year. According to recently released data from the Illinois Association of Realtors (IAR), the number of single-family Chicago homes, Chicago condos and townhouses sold in July totaled 6,625 (up 19.2% from 5,560 the same month in 2010). This tally is for the Chicagoland PMSA, which is a region made up of Cook, DuPage, Will, Lake, Kane, DeKalb, Grundy, Kendall and McHenry counties.

This year-over-year increase was also seen in the Chicago real estate market, but on a smaller scale. In the city of Chicago buyers closed on 1,655 homes in July 2011 (a 4.2% improvement from July 2010 when 1,588 homes sold during the month). Median price in the city also showed gains with a 6.9% rise to $210,000 this July (it was $196,500 in July 2010), according to the IAR report.

Throughout the state of Illinois nearly 8,200 homes sold last month, which was 18.4% better than the previous year. Of the 100 counties in Illinois included in the IAR’s report, 63 had year-over-year gains in July. Some of the most significant increases were in Rock Island County (up 44%), Champaign County (up 43.4%), DuPage County (up 41.6%) and Lake County (up 35%).

July was the first month where real estate analysts could compare year-over-year home sales without the federal homebuyer tax credit offsetting sales figures. The dramatic jump in buyer activity in several areas of Illinois is a promising sign that housing trends are moving in a positive direction for the state. Still, unsold units in the city of Chicago (especially condos and distressed/bank-owned properties) need to be absorbed back into the market before we can hope to see a full recovery on the home front.