Dive Brief:

• Owners who sold their homes during the first quarter of 2017 got an average 24% return, or $44,000, on their original purchase price, according to ATTOM Data Solutions' Q1 2017 U.S. Home Sales Report. That’s the highest price gain for sellers in nearly a decade.

• Those sellers had owned their property for an average of 7.97 years, trailing the record 8 years set in Q4 2016.

• San Jose, CA, San Francisco and Los Angeles had the highest average return across 97 metro areas that saw at least 1,000 homes sold in the first quarter. San Jose, San Francisco and Seattle saw the biggest percentage return on the purchase price at 71%, 65% and 56%, respectively.

Dive Insight:

The spring selling season if off to a strong start, with the average home in March going under contract in 49 days — 11 fewer days than the year before, according to Redfin. Roughly 20% of homes sold last month went under contract within two weeks, with almost 22% selling for more than their listed price.

The combination of low for-sale inventory levels and high demand is driving price growth that has many would-be sellers opting to remain in their homes rather than listing them out of concern that they might not find an affordable replacement in time. Still, both new-home and existing-home sales rose in March, suggesting that there is plenty of demand relative to the current supply of available homes.

According to a recent Gallup poll, six in 10 U.S. adults expect to see housing prices rise over the next year, up from 55% who said the same in 2016. Though the figure falls short of 2005's record 70%, it is a significant departure from recession-era sentiment that saw just 22% of Americans in 2009 expecting to see growth in prices and, by extension, the value of their home.