The median price of all home and condo resales last month in the core Orlando market was $110,000, up 1.8 percent from a month earlier and a 16 percent increase from February 2011, according to a report released Wednesday by the Orlando Regional Realtor Association.

The number of houses on the market continued a steady decline that began in July 2010, when 16,563 properties were listed for sale. Now the Orlando Realtors’ core market (mainly Orange and Seminole counties) has 9,253 houses ready to sell.

Based on February’s sales pace, the current inventory of houses and condominiums would last five months, down slightly from January and from a six-month supply a year ago.

“Economists consider a six-month supply of homes to be an indicator of a market that is balanced between buyers and sellers,” said association Chairman Stephen Baker, broker for Re/Max Central Realty. “A pace of 4.99 tilts the favor slightly toward sellers, and at the same time buyers are going to be challenged finding suitable homes because of the low inventory.”

Association members handled 1,854 existing-home sales in February, down 15 percent from a year ago and down half that much from January. Nearly 40 percent of those February sales were “normal,” one-third were short sales, and foreclosure sales accounted for the other 27 percent. A year ago, only one-fourth of all sales were considered conventional transactions and not a distress deal of one kind or the other.

“Sellers of normal homes should take heart,” Baker said in a prepared statement. “The sales of normal homes have really taken off; they are up 29.02 percent over this time last year and 17.14 percent over last month alone.”

The median prices of the normal sales was $150,000, down 3 percent from a year ago; the median short-sale price was up 5.3 percent, to $100,000, while the median bank-owned price was up 8.1 percent, to $80,000.

The average interest rate on a 30-year loan paid by home buyers in February was 3.92 percent — the lowest rate since Orlando Realtors began tracking the statistic in January 1995.

mshanklin@tribune.com or 407-420-5538