Sales of preowned homes in the US surged in February at the quickest pace in six months as buyers moved in on a modest drop in mortgage rates. The country’s median price also dropped, marking its first annual fall since 2012. Existing home sales rose 14.5% last month from the previous month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.58 million, beating economists’ expectations of 4.2 million, according to FactSet. The median home price fell 0.2% from February 2018 to $363,000. First-time buyer sales accounted for 27% of total sales; Yun says that under 30% is “not good news”.