Will 2014’s Housing Prices be as High as 2013’s in San Diego County?

Even though the back end of 2013 had a major slowdown in San Diego County, overall the year’s end displayed one of the best housing price appreciations in the nation according to the San Diego Union-Times.

In a study released on Tuesday by S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index, they indicated that the year over year from December 2012 to December 2013  home value of real estate in San Diego County jumped 18 percent. This would register our market as fifth best on the 20-city index.

This growth was the best appreciation in San Diego County since 2004 when values increased to as high as 26.6 percent, while this year’s rose to 21.5 percent in August.

The S&P/Case Shiller Index compares repeat sales of single family homes, and it displayed that since the end of 2013 San Diego County real estate’s price gains were slowing to 0.4 percent between November and December of last year. This drop was the first one recorded since January 2013.

“The slowdown in the second half of the year was due to fewer distressed resales and some increased inventory, although supply is still historically low,” said San Diego State real estate professor Michael Lea to the San Diego Union-Times. “(He sees) San Diego returning to single digit appreciation in the coming months as the region returns to a more normal market.”

“We’re going to continue to have nice house price appreciation numbers because we’re building hardly any new single family houses. As the economy slowly creates more jobs, people feel good about it, they’re going to want to either buy or upgrade.”

According to Lea, he felt the decrease in December was the issue about fewer expensive homes in San Diego County changing ownership.

On the national side of things in the 20-city index, the country had its best growth since 2005 where it increased to 15.5 percent. In 2013, the numbers in the U.S. rose to 13.4 percent.

Recovering values may be over though according to S&P Dow Jones chairman of the index Committee David Blitzer.

“Recent economic reports suggest a bleaker picture for housing,” Blitzer said to the Union-Times. “Some of the weakness reflects the cold weather in much of the country. However, higher home prices and mortgage rates are taking a toll on affordability.”

According to the Freddie Mac Report, the 30-year fixed mortgage rate was 4.46 percent in December, which is an uptick from 3.41 percent in January 2013. According to DataQuick, the median price for a home in San Diego County was at $420,000 which is a rise of 14.8 percent in the year over year. S&P /Case Shiller Index showed that San Diego County’s Value in December was 193.87, which is an increase from the 164.31 posted in 2012.

According to U-T San Diego, the San Diego index hit a peak of 250.34 percent prior the recession in November 2005 before faltering to a low of 144.43 percent in April 2009. San Diego County presently stands at 193.87 in the index.

The city with the largest year over year gain, with the increased value of 25.5 percent was Las Vegas. Respectively San Francisco posted 22.6 percent, Los Angeles was at 20.5 and Atlanta was fourth at 18.1 percent.

By Linda Moore

 

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