Here at Home Front we confess not to knowing what it means exactly: But the new MDA DataQuick numbers released earlier today show that the median sales price in Sacramento County - for new and existing homes combined - rose $5,000 from February to March.
The new $165,000 median represents the first upward movement in the "all home" category from one month to the next in more than a year. And it's happened only a handful of times since the Sacramento County median peaked in Aug. 2005 at $387,000.
The first thing anybody tells you is never make too much of one month's data. But along this line, the median sales price in Southern California has held stready for three months, prompting even DataQuick to suggest the market "may be exploring price floor levels."
We also note in the story that March makes 12 straight months of sales numbers that are higher than the same time a year earlier. That comes after 37 months of year-over-year declines in the region. Patrick Newport, economist for Massachusetts-based IHS Global Insight said 45 states are still seeing sales decline from last year.
A couple other extra nuggets regarding Sacramento County from the DataQuick March report: (Sac County represents about 66 percent of sales in the eight-county region).
- FHA-insured loans usually given to first-time buyers were 42.2 percent of loans behind the March buys.
- People believed to be investors accounted for 25 percent of sales - same level as at the height of the buying frenzy in 2004.
- Bank repos were 66.5 percent of all sales. That's down from a peak of 71.2 percent in January.
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