Home News Case-Shiller: San Francisco Home Prices Rose Again in March, Climbing 22% YOY

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By Brandon Cornett | Housing Market News
June 14, 2013 | © 2013, All rights reserved

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By Brandon Cornett | June 14, 2013 | 2013, All rights reserved

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The housing market in San Francisco continues to be a standout, where prices are concerned. According to the latest release of the SP/Case-Shiller Home Price Index, house values in San Francisco rose 3.9% from February to March of this year. Prices have risen by a whopping 22% annually, when measured from March 2012 to March 2013. There is a two-month reporting lag with the Case-Shiller index, which is published on the last Tuesday of every month.

The chart below shows the 20 cities that make up the Case-Shiller 20-city composite. As you can see, the San Francisco real estate market experienced the second-largest annual gain in home prices, slightly behind Phoenix, Ariz.

San Francisco had the largest monthly gain of any metro in the 20-city index, and one of the largest monthly returns in the country. According to the Case-Shiller index, San Francisco property prices rose by 3.9% from February to March.

The Bay Area real estate market continues to rise a wave of recovery that has spread across the entire state. In the chart above, you’ll also notice strong annual returns for San Diego and Los Angeles. These returns are indicative of the positive housing trends throughout California.

In San Francisco’s real estate market, as in other metros across the Sunshine State, housing inventories have plummeted. According to Realtor.com’s monthly housing summary, the total number of homes listed for sale in San Francisco has dropped by 31.22% over the last year. This trend is being seen in other California cities as well, and often to a larger degree. Listing inventory is down 52% in Orange County, 46% in Oakland, and 45% in San Jose.

These are unprecedented statistics. Imagine half of a local real estate market disappearing in a single year. It’s no wonder home buyers are having trouble finding properties in these markets. The supply-and-demand picture has shifted considerably over the last couple of years, and it’s sending prices north. In short, more buyers are vying for fewer properties.

The median list price within the San Francisco housing market has climbed by more than 20% over the last year, according to Realtor.com.

According to DataQuick, a San Diego-based company that provides real estate market data, the median sale price in the nine-county Bay Area reached $519,000 in May. That was an increase of 1.8% from the previous month and 29.8% from the same time last year. The median for San Francisco County climbed to $870,000 last month — the highest of any county in the Bay Area.

Within the city proper, the median sale price is a cool million. According to the real estate firm Redfin, sellers within the city are getting 112% of their asking prices, on average. Clearly, it’s a good time to be selling a home within the San Francisco real estate market.

Home sales have slowed over the last year. In May 2012, a total of 8,899 sales were recorded across the Bay Area. Last month, 8,541 sales were recorded, 4% fewer than the same time last year. In San Francisco County, home sales have declined by 14% over the last year. But this is certainly not due to a lack of demand. It’s from a lack of inventory. If every buyer who wanted to buy a home in the Bay Area could actually find one, sales would probably be 20% to 30% higher this year.

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Filed under Housing Market News

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Article source: http://www.homebuyinginstitute.com/news/case-shiller-san-francisco-409/

(Read More: Is the Refi ‘Apocalypse’ Really Upon Us?)

Analysts at Clear Capital, which runs a four-month moving average price index, note that January’s numbers show, “momentum stalls.” While they blame this on seasonal slowdowns, they point to Florida as a concern.

“Florida metros, namely Miami, Orlando, Tampa, and Jacksonville, were all missing from the top 15 performing market list. Since September 2011, at least one of these markets made the list,” cautions Dr. Alex Villacorta, Director of Research and Analytics at Clear Capital. “While this isn’t confirmation that the recovery is finished in the sunshine state, it’s certainly something to keep an eye on. These markets led the recovery in late 2011, and share some of the hallmarks for recovering markets overall.”

Florida’s housing market has been driven by distressed homes, and investors buying them at a rapid pace.

Other markets that saw the most distress during the housing crash, like Phoenix, Las Vegas, and much of California, have also seen so much investor demand, that prices are up by double digits from a year ago.

(Read More: New Housing Fears: Home Prices Rising Too Fast?)

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/100435276

We can all breathe a little easier now that the Bay Area was named one of the top 25 metro regions with the best air quality.

AOL Real Estate recently highlighted a study done by scientific engineering technology company Honeywell, where it looked at metro regions across the U.S. and ranked them based on air quality.  Rankings were based on pollen counts, ozone concentrations, public smoking laws, green initiatives and other factors.

The Bay Area (San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont) took the #15 spot, right behind the only other California metro region to make the list.  Surprisingly, Modesto, CA took the #16 ranking.

Florida was the state with the best showing.  Six cities from the sunshine state made the list.  For the full list, click here.

Article source: http://blog.sfgate.com/ontheblock/2012/11/14/bay-area-makes-lists-of-cities-with-high-air-quality/

Written by

Eric Glasser

North Redington Beach, Florida — If you really want to sell that house in this tough real estate market, you might want to consider advertising it north of the border.

New figures are out that show many of the buyers who are in the market are coming into Florida from outside the U.S.

According to a new survey from the National Association of Realtors, one in four homes now being sold in Florida is purchased by a foreign buyer. The biggest group? Canadians.

“The beach, the water, can’t beat it,” said Steve Barnes, who is enjoying a day of mini-golf at Smuggler’s Cove in North Redington Beach.

Barnes’ brother is among the thousands of Canadians who’ve decided now is the time to buy real estate in Florida. Now the whole family visits from Toronto, where the Sunshine State is heavily marketed.

“Daily, you see ads in the paper of how to buy Florida real estate,” said Barnes. “You never saw that two years ago.”

The economic reasons are pretty simple. A Canadian dollar used to be worth about 80 percent of a US dollar. These days, they’re basically even or on par. That, and lower prices have made for an attractive combination.

“We welcome them,” says Re/Max Real Estate Broker Steve Busse.

Busse, who specializes in foreign buyers, says waterfront is the hottest commodity. He also says he saw more buyers from other countries outside the U.S. this year. Many were Europeans  whose currencies are not tied to the Euro.

“Anywhere from 20 percent to 30 percent of my buyers were either Czech, Polish or Russian,” he said.

The trend suggests that if you want to sell in this tough real estate market, think globally.

Busse says sellers should place listings on Canadian city Craigslist sites and also consider foreign newspapers.

It may be worth it, since there’s now a one in four chance your buyer may not even be an American.

Experts say another advantage of selling to foreign buyers is that 90 percent of them pay cash.

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Article source: http://www.wtsp.com/news/local/article/219443/8/Foreigners-gobbling-up-Bay-area-real-estate