Posted on 04/15/2008 6:24:22 PM PDT by AndyJackson
The median sales price of Southern California homes fell below $400,000 in March, as the real estate market's traditional spring bounce was far weaker than normal, a real estate research firm reported today.
Houses and condominium units in Los Angeles, Orange, Ventura, San Bernardino, Riverside and San Diego counties sold at a median price of $385,000 last month... down 5.6% from February's $408,000, and down a record 23.8% from $505,000 in February 2007.

(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
ping
Houses in my neighborhood, when they do sell, are going for about 100K less than they did 3-4 years ago.
Well, it’s about time. Having seen the most pitiful CA houses selling for half million dollars on HGTV, one could only marvel that there were that many stupid people in one place.
And there is still plenty more silliness to anneal out.
actually in Sac town the prices for houses in the downtown areas only dropped about 5-7 %.
The homes in question are spec/investor or new homes located in either iffy so called up & coming locations or traffic invested burbs.
"Don't worry, it'll always go up"
If you sell your house now you will make a substantially smaller profit than if you had sold it a year or so back. But then when you turn around and buy another house, the price for the new house is also substantially reduced from a year ago as well. The mortgage payments for the new house may not be all that different from what you would have paid a year ago.
Southern California home prices take another hit
They forgot to tell that to many areas of San Diego.
Condos in my neighborhood go from $800,000 to 4 million a unit. And that is not the most expensive.
Our house is worth more than that, but we bought it for 185K 11 years ago. Not a bad return on our investment, even with the slip in prices.
Yeah, 9.5% per year from 1996 to 2007 is not too bad. In the subburbs of Houston, Sugar Land, my house increase in value 3% per year for 23 years. A full brick house, 1900 sq. ft. detatched garage, with swimming pool, (pool added by owner and not included in the 3% profit). BooHoo.

Tough to say what the total value of "nominal" losses that will have to be written down, but you can see from this St. Louis Fed chart that it was enough to wipe out the entire aggregate reserves of the U.S. banking sector.
That’s insane! Here in middle Tennessee, half a million will get you a 4500 square ft. brick house on fifty acres with out buildings and a pool!
What the salaries and job opportunities like compared to LA?
Jobs opportunities are good, car manufacturing, music and publishing. Cost of living is much lower and there (for now) is no state income tax. But before any California liberals get any ideas about moving, There are no Starbucks, everybody carries guns and drives duce and a half army trucks.
Ah, but in California the two seasons are fire and mud, with occasional earthquakes. In Tennessee, the two seasons are summer and February, with occasional tornadoes.
My daughter plans to move to the LA area in 2009. We hope the market continues to plummet.
You got it. Someone who has owned their home for 5+ years will do OK. Someone who bought their ‘home’ as an investment to be sold in 1-2 years is screwed - as they ought to be.
A home is a solid long-term investment. It is not a way to get rich quick. Anyone who thought so deserves to lose their money.
We don’t have the mud problems here.
Fire problem is scattered , and years inbetween.
Just like anyother state.
I live in the City of San Diego, no fires, no mud.
ave. of 4 to 6 inches rain a yr. No snow.
I have never used heat in my apt. as not needed.
You are thinking too logically....people like that would have refi’d to get his and hers Hummer H2s, flat screen TVs, monthly trips to Vegas.
Unless they refinanced at bubble "values" and spent all the cash on vacations and toys.
This is usually the case when you hear about someone who has owned their home for 15+ years and now is losing it due to the "evil mortgage holder".
You flatlanders down in the city need to get out more. Up here in Ramona, we had plenty of fire, rain, mud, and even a dusting of snow on the north edge of town. ;-) Still, since I bought my house in 1997, I ain’t bitching about housing costs.
So I have heard and saw on the local news.
I know it wasn’t fun.
I live in the heart of the city near downtown, Balboa Park
and a few miles from the harbor. A native of this area.
I enjoy living in a large city also the weather is much milder.
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