Heating, Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International (HARDI) released its monthly TRENDS report, showing average sales for HARDI distributor members increased by 15.9 percent in June 2016.

The average annualized growth for the 12 months through June 2016 was 7.2 percent. This annual growth rate has generally remained within the 6 percent to 7 percent range for most of the past two years.

“The strong sales this month helped push the annualized growth to more than 7 percent for only the second time in the past 24 months,” said HARDI Market Research & Benchmarking Analyst Brian Loftus. “It was warmer than normal across much of the country, and some systems had their first chance to stumble after the slow start to the cooling season.”

“The results are consistent with other consumer, residential or nonresidential building reports,” said HARDI Senior Economist Connor Lokar. “Existing and new home sales are doing well through the mid-point of the year. Housing starts overall are growing at a near-double digit pace, with single-family outperforming multi-family.”

The Days Sales Outstanding, a measure of how quickly customers pay their bills, is now 49.8.

“The DSO has traced a familiar pattern the past few calendar years,” Loftus said. “It ticked up unexpectedly this month. We will monitor to see if the move is a reflection of the strong sales activity.”

HARDI members do not receive financial compensation in exchange for their monthly sales data and can discontinue their participation without prior notice or penalty. Participation is voluntary, and the depth of market coverage varies from region to region. An independent entity collects and compiles the data that can include products not directly associated with the HVACR industry.