Analysts say housing prices in San Diego County held fairly steady last month, but home sales fell to the lowest level in ten years. We get more on the story from KPBS reporter Alan Ray.
From June of 2006 to last month, home prices in San Diego County were down nearly 2 percent, though the new numbers from DataQuick show an increase for May to June of about $3,500 to a new median price of $495,500.
Celia Chin is Director of Housing Economics at Moody's Economy.com . She says prices will probably continue to drop for another year to 18 months, but she also says the market isn't collapsing.
Chin: During the housing boom, we were seeing growth rates of 20 to 30 percent. And right now, certainly, the market has weakened quite a bit, but prices are down maybe 6 percent, year over year. So you're not losing all of the gains that were made previously, but we're certainly correcting.
With sales down to just over 3,500 last month, it was the slowest homes sales month in San Diego County since 1997.
Celia Chin says one of the things that could delay a recovery is that fact that the collapse of the subprime market has made lenders more conservative and home loans harder to get.
Alan Ray, KPBS News.
