Southern California home prices up 5.8%, weakest annual gain in 18 months

Southern California’s red-hot housing market continued to cool in July as rising home prices and interest rates discouraged homebuyers who are being priced out of the market, new housing figures released Thursday, Aug. 30, show.

The median price of a Southern California home – or price at the midpoint of all sales – was $530,000 in July. While that’s up 5.8 percent from July 2017 levels, it was the weakest annual growth in 18 months, “a further sign of the continuing erosion of affordability,” said CoreLogic analyst Andrew LePage.

“The combination of price increases and higher mortgage rates, which have climbed more than half a percentage point over the past year, means the mortgage payment on the median-priced home in Southern California has risen about 13 percent over the past year,” he said.

Home sales, meanwhile, were flat, CoreLogic figures show, rising by a mere by 63 transactions to 21,277 closed sales in July. That’s an increase of just 0.3 percent from July 2017 levels.

But because there was one extra business day last month, average daily sales actually fell 4.5 percent year over year. Average daily sales fell on a year-over-year basis for a fifth straight month in July in all six counties in the region, CoreLogic figures show.

“Without that extra day, sales this July would likely have fallen modestly year over year,” LePage said. “While low inventory is still constraining sales in some areas, the overall trend in recent months has been toward more listings, suggesting that sales also remain weak relative to current housing demand because more and more would-be buyers are unable or unwilling to buy.”

Median home prices were up in all six Southern California counties, with appreciation rates ranging from 5.7 percent in Los Angeles County to 8 percent in San Diego County.

The median was off from a record high of $537,000 in June.

But that’s typical this time of year, reflecting the seasonal change as home shoppers divert their attention in the summer from house hunting to vacations and getting the kids ready to return to school. CoreLogic figures show Southern California prices fell from June to July in 19 of the past 31 years.

Posted by https://goo.gl/TXzGV5