The North County and San Diego Real Estate markets continue to show modest gains in year-over, median home prices. But this may be due to the pressure caused by low resale inventory and the lack of new homes in our market.
The real estate market is slowing down. Sales have decreased consistently in the first half of this year when compared to the same time last year. Will this slump continue? The San Diego Union-Tribune polled their local experts in their weekly Econometer column. Opinions were evenly split, but even those who felt this slowdown was not necessarily long-term did concede that prices have moved beyond most buyers’ reach. Some also noted that we are nearing the end of an economic cycle.
June 2019 North County and San Diego Real Estate Report continues with trends that started last summer. Home prices are slowly rising while the volume of home sales drops and available inventory creeps up. North County showed a year-over median price increase of just 1.0 percent while San Diego County as a whole saw year-over prices rise by 2.6 percent.
The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Indices put San Diego metro price gains at the lowest of their 20-city index for the fourth month in a row. Even with low interest rates, the price of homes in high-cost markets like San Diego is keeping buyers at bay. Some experts do believe that interest rates may drop even lower. Those lower rates could help warm up our market.
The North County and San Diego Real Estate Market Report for February 2019 continues to show a slower market, but with drops in interest rates that started at the end of December, there has been a slight pickup in sales. That’s why closed sales numbers were down 16.2 percent in North County and 17.9 percent countywide compared to the previous January. But pending sales, which show more recent activity, dropped quite a bit less with a 1.1 percent decrease in North County, and a drop of 3.7 percent countywide.
Experts anticipate that interest rates will rise as high as 5.5 percent in 2019. If this happens, it will most likely put a damper on home sales and appreciation. But because income growth is strong in San Diego, Zillow still predicts our market will be one of the top 10 hottest markets in 2019.