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California Housing Market Ends Year on High Note
California’s housing market closed out 2020 on a high note, recording solid sales and a fifth record-high median price in December, the California Association of Realtors (C.A.R.) reported on Friday. That bright note was achieved despite a global pandemic that lingered most of the year, two lockdowns and a struggling economy.
Closed escrow sales of existing, single-family detached homes in California totaled a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 509,750 units in December. December home sales ticked up 0.2% from 508,820 in November and were up 28% from a year ago, when 398,370 homes were sold on an annualized basis.
The year-over-year, double-digit sales gain was the fifth consecutive and the largest yearly gain since May 2009. For the year as a whole, annual home sales rose to a preliminary 411,870 closed escrow sales in California, up 3.5% from 2019’s pace of 397,960.
C.A.R. President Dave Walsh says, “It’s a testament to the strength of the market that even after the pandemic effectively shut down the spring home-buying season in 2020, the market still was able to recover the substantial sales lost in the first half of the year and even top 2019’s levels. With mortgage rates expected to stay near the lowest in history, demand for homeownership will continue to be strong, so home sales should remain elevated into the first half of 2021, as motivated buyers take advantage of the increased purchasing power.”
California’s median home price bounced back as well, setting another record high in December. The statewide median home price rose 2.7% on a month-to-month basis to $717,930 in December, up from November’s $698,890. Home prices continued to gain on a year-over-year basis with the statewide median price surging 16.8% from $614,880 recorded last December.
The double-digit increase from last year was the fifth in a row, and the month-to-month gain was higher than the long-run average of 0.8% observed between 1979 and 2019. The statewide median home price for the entire year was $659,380, an increase of 11.3% from a revised $592,230 in 2019.
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- ◦Economy
