California: Median Home Price Continues to Climb

By: Alex Veiga: REALTOR® Magazine Online
While the total number of homes sold last month in California dropped 2.4 percent from the same time last year, the median price continued to rise, jumping 17.4 percent to $451,000.

On a month-to-month basis, July sales were down 8.3 percent from June, while prices were off 1.3 percent. DataQuick analyst John Karevoll characterizes these shifts as normal and healthy market activity and is dismissive of assertions that the housing market in California is a bubble waiting to burst.

He notes that June 2005 and July 2004, the two benchmarks for DataQuick's analysis, are "the two strongest months out there." The Bay Area and Southern California pull the numbers up, as the median home price in the former rose 17.9 percent from last year to $606,000; while in the south, the median price increased 16.7 percent to $469,000. In northern California, Contra Costa County registered the largest increase, as its median home price climbed 23.3 percent from last year to $555,000.