Here's the meat of the July report from DataQuick.The number of Southern California homes sold last month edged up to its highest level in more than a year as bargain hunters swept up foreclosure properties in affordable neighborhoods, a real estate information service reported.
A total of 20,329 new and resale houses and condos sold in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino and Orange counties last month. That was up 16.7 percent from 17,424 the previous month and up 13.8 percent from 17,867 for July a year ago, according to San Diego-based MDA DataQuick.
The median price paid for a Southland home was $348,000 last month, down 2.0 percent from $355,000 in June and down 31.1 percent from $505,000 for July 2007. That peak of $505,000 was reached in March, April, May and July of last year.
Foreclosure resales continue to be a dominant factor in today's Southern California market, accounting for 43.6 percent of all resales. That was up from a revised 41.8 percent in June, and up from 7.9 percent in July 2007. Foreclosure resales -- where a foreclosure had occurred at some point in the prior 12 months -- ranged from 22.2 percent of all resales in Orange County last month to 64.4 percent in Riverside County.
X's comments,
The sales numbers are way up this month in nearly every area. This is not surprising because last year the sales numbers were incredibly bad. To put in it perspective last June in Riverside there were 3359 sales but in July that number plummeted to 2769 and it continued to plummet all last fall. So don't let those "big increases" in sales numbers fool you. It's only because last year's market was at a dead stop.
As you can see the market IS foreclosures. 65% of the resales were foreclosures. I wonder what percentage were short sales?? New homes are also included in these numbers.
The prices continue to drop at an olympian pace. The median for Riverside dropped from $275k to $260k in the last month. That's a 5.5% drop in ONE MONTH! San Berdu wasn't too far behind with a 4.2% monthly drop in median price.
There are going to be some big headlines in the next week about those big sales increases. Don't be fooled though. The data does not lie. Sales are up but only because of last years sales drought. Prices are down and still falling and that's really all you need to know. As long as prices are still falling, it's NOT a great time to buy!
And for anyone thinking, "now that sales seem to have bottomed out, a price bottom can't be far behind" I saw an interesting tidbit on the LA Times blog. In the last real estate downturn, sales bottomed out 4 years before prices did. Prices fell an additional 27% in that 4 years after the sales bottomed out.
And for anyone thinking, "now that sales seem to have bottomed out, a price bottom can't be far behind" I saw an interesting tidbit on the LA Times blog. In the last real estate downturn, sales bottomed out 4 years before prices did. Prices fell an additional 27% in that 4 years after the sales bottomed out.
6 comments:
I myself, am also curious as to what makes up the other side of the market. Are they mostly short sales? Do buyers that sign over title to the bank count as a sale? Are most of the non foreclosures way above median $$$? How many are plain vanilla sales made to future knife catchers? How many are sales where the previous sale is decades old?
Still too many negative reasons for a home to sell to claim a bottom.
With prices falling 5% a month nearly every one buying these days is catching a falling knife. With price declines this extreme we are miles from a bottom.
I know it seems like it's taking forever for the prices to fall but it's not. These price declines are moving so fast it's almost scary.
X, I know that prices are declining, but I think everyone feels like it's taking a long time because prices have been (and still are) in the ridiculous zone for years now. Even with a 25-30% decline in asking prices, we're still far from affordable prices...although, I've gone from laughing my ass off at asking prices to saying, "Ok, you're getting there..." I've found that most people are still overpricing by 100k for this market, especially in the nicer areas.
I've had 3 or 4 houses come up in the last month that were tantalizingly close to my target range. I wanted to make an offer on one but I knew it would sell over listing price so I didn't bother. I'll probably be a little bummed if I find out it sold for what is was listed at. I'm still shooting for early next year. My wife say's she's not moving to after Xmas anyway.
X, I am curious as what you believe the target $/sqft should be in the Eastvale and Corona areas? (Basically, anywhere along the 15 and north of the 91)
The $S/F will vary depending on the size of the home. Larger homes usually fetch less on a $S/F basis than small homes do. I think most of the IE has another 10% to 20% to go before we get back to the traditional values. Whether you look at comparable rental value or income to home price, we are still not down to the the average ratios yet.
I think the smaller homes in Eastvale will fall to around $100 s/f or just slightly more than that. The bigger homes will be less, maybe down into the mid 80's to low $90s for the 4000 s/f+ jobs.
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