• Interest rates continue to remain near their historic lows. The fixed-rate mortgage was 6.10 percent in December, below November’s 6.21 percent, and slightly lower than 6.14 percent from December 2006.

• December’s fixed-rate was at its lowest level in the past five months, having peaked in July 2007 at 6.7 percent.

• Month-to-month sales increased for the second month in a row, rising 4.7 percent in December compared with November.

• The time a home remained on the market prior to selling improved to 67.2 days in December compared to 72.1 days for the same period a year ago.

• In December, it would have taken 14.5 months to sell all the homes on the market at the current sales rate, an improvement compared with November, when it would have taken 15.4 months.

• Although seasonally adjusted sales fell 33.4 percent year to year in December 2007 compared with 2006, they were above the 300,000-unit level for the first time since August 2007.