ST. JOSEPH — The number of houses sold and dollar volume in November not only outperformed November of last year, but were the highest sales and dollar-volume for a November since 2007.

“This year in November, 213 houses were sold versus  188 a year ago, which is a 13 percent increase. The total dollar volume in November was up 16 percent over November 2011,” said Gary Walter, executive vice president of the Southwestern Michigan Association of Realtors Inc.

“The strong housing market performance over the last seven months has kept the year-to-date, number of houses sold up 22 percent and the year-to-date, total dollar volume up 29 percent above the results in November 2011,” Walter said.

The average selling price in November rose a modest 2 percent above November 2011 ($179,200 vs. $175,072). For the month, the median selling price rocketed 28 percent to reach $112,000 compared to $88,000 a year ago.

Year-to-date, the average selling price in November was $168,196 compared to $158,961 in November 2011, which is a 6 percent increase.

The year-to-date median selling price also was up 6 percent at $105,000 in November versus $98,900 in November 2011.

The median price is the price at which 50 percent of the homes sold were above that price and 50 percent were below.

In Southwestern Michigan, the local housing market in November recorded the lowest percentage of bank-owned or foreclosed homes as a part of all closed transactions for the year at 23 percent.

Previously, there were three months this year that shared 24 percent as the lowest percentage. For the last seven months, the bank-owned or foreclosed homes percentage has been at or below 29 percent. January was the peak point at 46 percent.

Locally, the mortgage rate decreased to 3.43 from 3.60 in October. Last year in November, the mortgage rate was 4.18.