Home Sales Rebound in L.A. County
After taking a tumble in October, home sales in Los Angeles County bounced back last month, returning to the healthy growth that has characterized the housing market for the last three years, real estate analysts said Friday.
Home sales, including those of condominiums and newly built houses, rose 7.1% in November in L.A. County, compared with the same month last year, according to real estate information company Acxiom/DataQuick of La Jolla.
The increase stands in sharp contrast to the year-over-year data posted in October, when countywide sales fell 2.5%, the only decline since September 1996.
“Now we’re back pretty much on the same track we’ve been on for a couple of years, with steady sales increases,” said DataQuick analyst John Karevoll, who called the October dip a “temporary hiccup” in the market.
Karevoll and others blamed the anomalous October figures on this fall’s short-lived surge in mortgage rates and consumers’ uncertainty about the stock market.
But with the return to low interest rates and continued strength in the regional economy, analysts and real estate agents predict the market will renew its steady climb in sales and price appreciation.
“I would expect more of the same--slow, stable, consistent growth,” said real estate agent James Joseph, owner of Century 21 Grisham-Joseph in Whittier. “I really don’t see anything out on the horizon--good or bad--that is going to change that.”
Home prices in Los Angeles County also rose in November, with the median home price up 7.6% over last November to $184,000. The figure includes resale condos and new homes.
Breaking the numbers down by category, sales of existing single-family homes rebounded heartily in November, growing by 6.4% over last year, for a total of 5,547 homes sold. In October, 6,531 existing single-family homes were sold, but that number was down 4.5% from October 1997.
Condo resales rose by 12.2% this November over last, and new-home sales were up 0.6% over last year.
Marty Rodriguez, owner of Century 21 Marty Rodriguez, said she has seen little slowdown this fall in her San Gabriel Valley territory, where 70% of the deals her agents close are for homes priced under $250,000.
Buyers, she said, want to get in on low mortgage rates, anxious that the bargain rates won’t last.
“We’re still amazed we’re as busy as we are at the holidays,” she said.
Likewise, Randall W. Lewis of Upland-based Lewis Homes said new-home builders expect strong 1999 sales. Buyers, he said, “recognize that interest rates are low, the economy is good, and that prices are headed up.”
The monthly data released Friday by Acxiom/DataQuick also showed Ventura County sales up 15.9% over last year, with the median home price rising to $230,000, an increase of 11.1%.
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Priced to Sell
Los Angeles County’s median home price fell short of the highs reached in the summer, when activity in high-end markets drove prices up. Median home prices, thousands of dollars:
November: $184,000
* Source: Acxiom/DataQuick
