Orange County’s median home price dropped $3,000 in February from January despite seeing an increase in sales.
The median price for an OC home was $417,000 in February, compared to $420,000 in January, according to San Diego-based MDA DataQuick, a unit of Canada’s MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates.
Sales of less expensive homes dominated sales, bringing down the median price.
The median here still is up 11.2% from a year earlier, when home prices weighed in at $375,000.
Sales also were up, rising 5.7% from February 2009 with 1,986 homes sold last month. There were 173 more homes sold in February than January.
For all of Southern California, the median price for a home was $275,000 last month, up 1.3% from January and up 10% from the $250,000 average in February 2009.
This represented the 20th consecutive month Southern California home prices rose year-over-year.
Sales remained flat at 15,359 homes in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino and Orange counties last month. That was a slight uptick from the 15,231 homes sold in February 2009.
“It’s possible the stars won’t line up this way again for many years. With prices and mortgage interest rates this low, the cost of ownership is about as low as we’ve seen it in decades,” said John Walsh, MDA DataQuick president. “The market is less lopsided, but before a real rebalancing occurs adjustable-rate and jumbo mortgages need to come back. Not to where they were in 2007, but back to where they were a few years before that.”
