The housing recovery appears to be skipping huge swaths of the state, according to sales data released this morning from the Minnesota Association of Realtors. It said that while closed sales across the state were up 4.6 percent during July, more than half of the 13 regions tracked by the group saw significant declines in the number of closed sales. The biggest gains are being made in the 7-county metro area, but at this point it's still too soon to tell which regions are losing the most ground - sales have been sporadic from month to month and from region to region, suggesting that seasonal factors could be at play. Generally, the regions that are seeing the best job growth are performing the best. That includes regional centers such as Rochester, Duluth and the Moorhead area.

The median price of all sales that closed during the month in the state was up 11.1 percent to $160,000, but there were a handful of regionsl that saw double-digit declines in the median price. As an indication of the health of the market, the monthly median sale price isn't always the best measure. It's a figure that's heavily influenced by various shifts in the market, including a recent decline in the number of very inexpensive foreclosure sales across the state and an increase in pricier listings. The sample size in some markets is also small enough that it can be impacted by just a few upper-bracket, or extremely inexpensive, transactions.

Listings across the state continue to fall and that's helping decrease the time for listings to sell. The average market time fell to average of 92 days, down from 112 days last year. That was the sixth straight monthly decline. Sellers are also getting a higher percent of their asking price, with homeowners receiving 93.5 percent of their list price, up 3 percent from last year.