Distressed properties slow region’s recovery
County prices, sales continue to improve
By Roger Showley, UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
Wednesday, December 16, 2009 at 12:02 a.m.
As San Diego County’s housing market slowly climbs back to normal, Southern California as a whole still suffers from a high level of distressed properties, MDA DataQuick reported yesterday.
“This market is still really lopsided,” DataQuick President John Walsh said in a statement. “Foreclosures and short sales (homes sold for less their mortgage balance) are huge factors. There’s still not a lot of discretionary buying and selling outside the more affordable markets. Anybody who can sit tight is doing just that.”
While the six-county region’s overall median price was unchanged last month at $285,000 from year-ago levels, prices in San Diego, Orange and Ventura counties were in positive territory. Foreclosure-plagued San Bernardino and Riverside counties were down 13.6 percent and 9.1 percent respectively. Los Angeles was also in negative territory, off 3.2 percent. The November median for the region was up $5,000 from October.