A combined 21-percent increase in the Region's home sales for August is being attributed to “pent-up-demand,” with more normal buyers coming back, as well as affordability. Peter Novak, CEO of the Greater Northwest Indiana Association of Realtors, says they have now seen 14 straight months of growth in the number of units sold, when comparing year-to-year statistics. Novak says that another reason to be cautiously optimistic is their automatic appointment scheduler, which has been up tremendously over the summer, by about 50-percent from last year, with over 15,000 individual appointments for showings scheduled in July alone. He says that number never exceeded 10,000 last year, and while that does not indicate people are buying, it definitely shows they are looking. Single-family homes in August in Lake County rose almost 25-percent from a year ago, while Porter County's August home sales jumped 19-and-a-half percent from the previous year.