Decline seen in home sales
Realtors group also projects rise in median price
By Roger Showley
Union-Tribune Staff Writer
The slumping economy will likely reduce home sales by 2.3 percent next year after they rose the last two years, the California Association of Realtors predicted yesterday.
At the trade group’s annual conference in San Jose, chief economist Leslie Appleton-Young forecast that single-family-resale house sales will drop from this year’s 540,000 to 527,500 next year. Prices are projected to rise 3.3 percent to a median of $280,000.
Sales peaked at 625,000 in 2004 before falling to 346,900 in 2007 as the recession began to take hold, the figures showed. Prices rose to a record median $560,300 in 2007 before falling more than 50 percent to this year’s estimated $271,000.