California home prices near 4-year high
California home sale prices came close to a 4-year high in July, with the pace of sales year-over-year growing for the fourth month in a row, the CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® reported.
Making sense of the story
- The median home price in July for an existing single-family home was
$333,860 last month, up 4.2 percent from $320,540 in June and nearly 13 percent
from a year ago, when the median home price in California was $296,160.
- July’s median home price was the highest since August 2008, when it was
$352,730. July also marked the fifth consecutive month that the median price
increased month-over-month and year-over-year.
- Sales in July rose to an annualized pace of 529,230 homes, an increase of
15.3 percent compared with last July.
- California’s housing inventory was nearly flat in July, with the index of existing, single-family homes at 3.4 months compared with 3.5 months in June. However, July’s inventory was down from a revised 5.6-month supply in July 2011. The index indicates the number of months needed to sell the supply of homes on the market at the current sales rate. A 7-month inventory is considered normal.
