Homebuilders see sales perk up in past two weeks

By the fourth week of national social-distancing efforts, home sales shrank 85% from the usual spring pace.

In the past two weeks, though, home sales numbers have started to rise, according to John Burns Real Estate Consulting, which tracks hundreds of U.S. builders.

"We’re still down roughly 65%, but more positive news is coming out of the new home market, particularly for builders who are targeting the first time and entry level buyers," the firm's manager of research, Devyn Bachman, told CNBC.

Newly built homes have an advantage amid the pandemic as they're easier to show in person.

There are also more newly built homes for sale than existing homes as sellers, concerned about buyers walking through their homes and values potentially dropping, took their homes off the market.

Another factor feeding the increase in home sales is that apartment dwellers in urban areas may be looking to move to the suburbs because they're uncertain about how long social-distance guidelines will last and what happens after lockdowns are lifted.