A decrease in cash sales in February put 2016 on track to have the lowest share of such transactions in eight years. CoreLogic said that all cash purchases accounted for 35.7 percent of all home sales in February, a decline of 2.5 percentage points compared to February 2015 and down 0.1 point from January 2016. 

For the first two months of 2016, the cash sales share averaged 35.6 percent, the lowest start for any year since 2008.  Cash sales hit a high of 46.6 percent in January 2011 when distressed sales were also at historic levels.  Prior to the housing crisis, the cash sales share of total home sales averaged approximately 25 percent. CoreLogic predicts that, if the cash sales continue to fall at the same rate as in February, the share should return to that level by mid-2018.

Real estate-owned (REO) sales had the largest proportion of cash sales in February 2016 at 59.2 percent with resales second at 35.6 percent, short sales at 32.6 percent and newly constructed homes at 15.2 percent. While the percentage of REO sales that were all-cash transactions remained high, REO transactions accounted for only 7.8 percent of all sales during the month compared to 23.9 percent of sales when cash sales were at their peak.  Resales typically make up the majority of home sales (about 79 percent in February 2016), and therefore have the biggest impact on the total cash sales share.

Alabama had the largest cash sales share of any state at 51.7 percent, followed by Florida (49.2 percent), New York (46.9 percent), Indiana (44.8 percent) and West Virginia (44.2 percent). Of the nation's largest 100 Core Based Statistical Areas (CBSAs), Philadelphia had the highest cash sales share at 54.5 percent, followed by Detroit (53.8 percent), West Palm Beach-Boca Raton (53.4 percent), Miami (52.5 percent), and Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla. (51.8 percent). Syracuse, N.Y. had the lowest cash sales share at 11.5 percent.