By DOUG WILSON
Herald-Whig Senior Writer

Quincy area home sales were level in October with 61 closings, matching the September sales.

Alan Vandeboe, an agent at Century 21 Awerkamp and Hays, keeps statistics on home sales and sees a strong, healthy housing market. He was not surprised that local sales did not mirror a national home sales surge of 10.1 percent in October.

"We didn't see that here, but by the same token, we didn't see the decreases there were nationwide in the past couple of years," Vandeboe said. "Our market has been fairly steady. The jobless rate around this area isn't the greatest, but it's not bad. There are still buyers out there."

The 61 sales in October are on track for the year, with 612 closings by the end of last month. There were 586 closings at that same point in 2008 and 726 closings in the record year of 2007.

Mike Mahair, president of State Street Bank, said low interest rates have helped home sales.

"We're offering interest rates of 4.25 percent on 15-year fixed rate loans and 5 percent on 30-year loans," Mahair said.

Nationally, average rates for 30-year fixed mortgages fell this week, matching a record low set last spring and more than a full percentage point below what they were a year ago.

Freddie Mac reported rates for 30-year mortgages averaged 4.78 percent this week, down from 4.83 percent last week and equaling the record low reached the week of April 30. The average rate on a 15-year fixed-rate mortgage fell to 4.29 percent, down from 4.32 percent last week. The 15-year rate hasn't been this low since Freddie Mac started tracking it in 1991.

Banks in the region also have had relatively few foreclosures because there were few of the high-risk loans that led to a housing market collapse in some metropolitan areas.

Sales of new homes rose last month to the highest level in more than a year as strong activity in the South offset weakness in the rest of the country. The Commerce Department reported this week that sales rose 6.2 percent.

There were 239,000 new homes for sale at the end of October, the lowest inventory level in nearly four decades. At the current sales pace, that's a 6.7 months of supply, down from last winter's peak of more than a year.

"The thing that has saved the Midwest is that home prices generally increase in the 2 to 3 percent range each year. They had 20 and 25 percent price appreciation in some parts of California" and other states before those inflated markets plummeted, Mahair said.

"We didn't have the high highs and we're not going to have the low lows," Mahair said.

Part of the interest has involved a first-time homebuyers program offering up to an $8,000 tax credit for qualifying buyers. The program was set to expire at the end of the month, but has been extended until April by Congress.

Another program offers up to $6,500 in tax credits for people who have owned a home at least five years and meet other qualifications. That program will continue through April 30.

Vandeboe, who also is a member of the Quincy Association of Realtors Board, said the average sale price in Adams County so far this year is $117,200. That's about $1,000 less than the average price for all of last year and up about $600 from 2007.

"We never did really see a decrease in prices," Vandeboe said.

That information baffles some home buyers who believe the national real estate slowdown had a huge affect on sales in every market.

"All real estate is local and people should be talking to local Realtors to find out what's happening," Vandeboe said.

The resale market nationally is also strong. The National Association of Realtors said home resales rose 10 percent from September to October, the biggest monthly increase in a decade. Along with the tax credit, buyers are being attracted by low prices and mortgage rates.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

-- dwilson@whig.com/221-3372