State housing market a mixed bag

California’s housing market ended 2014 on a whimper, not a bang.

Sales were up 0.6 percent in December compared with exactly one year before, a “negligible’ increase but the first time since July 2013 that statewide home sales were up year over year, according to the California Association of Realtors.

Overall, sales dropped 7.6 percent last year compared with 2013: from 414,900 units sold two years ago to an estimated 383,320 single-family homes that closed escrow during 2014, according to the association’s monthly report on the state housing market released Thursday.

While those numbers are anything but spectacular, they also aren’t anything to despair over, said Leslie Appleton-Young, vice president and chief economist with the Los Angeles-based association.

“Twenty fourteen saw a return to a near-normal housing market, with sales moving at a moderate pace and home-price appreciation growing at more sustainable levels,” Appleton-Young said in a statement. “Home prices have stabilized over the past year, which is positive news for buyers who have been putting off their home search until prices leveled off.

“With the recent news of an improvement in the job market and the lowest interest rates in a year and a half, buyers may be resuming their home search.”

The median price of a single-family home in California in December was $452,570, up 3.1 percent in December 2013. Median home prices have been going up year-over-year for more than 24 months, although the price increases have gotten smaller recently, the report stated.