Housing Market Drops Slightly

Southern California’s housing market suffered a slight drop in September, as sales were down nearly one percent year-over-year.

Overall, 20,927 new and resale houses and condominiums were sold in the six-county region last month compared with 21,093 in September 2015, according to data released Wednesday by CoreLogic in Irvine.

Despite that decline, last month’s sales number was the second-highest tally for September since September 2009, when 21,539 houses were sold in Southern California.

The median price of a home in Southern California – Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties – last month was $460,000, a year-over-year increase of 5.7 percent.

Much of what happened in the market in September can be attributed to seasonal factors, said Andrew LePage, research analyst with CoreLogic.

“It’s not unusual for the median [price] to decline modestly between August and September, in part because demand begins to soften heading into the fall,” LePage said in a statement. “Many buyers buy before school starts.”

Locally, the decline in home sales last month mirrored what was recorded in all of Southern California.

Sales were down 0.6 percent in Riverside County and 1.9 percent in San Bernardino County compared with last year, according to CoreLogic.

However, the two-county region’s median prices were moving in the right direction: $334,500 in Riverside County, an increase of 6.2 percent year-over-year, and $298,250 in San Bernardino County, an increase of 11.1 percent during that time, CoreLogic reported.