April Home Prices Set Southland Record
From the Los Angeles Times:
Southern California home prices in April soared more than 25% — the largest annual increase in more than 16 years — to a record high as surging mortgage rates pushed buyers into the housing market before rates and prices head higher, according to a real estate report today. April's red-hot real estate market, however, is expected to cool off later this year as mortgage rates are projected to continue to move up from record lows, according to industry analysts.The median price of all houses and condominiums sold in Southern California in April hit $307,000, on a 7.3% increase in sales, according to DataQuick Information Systems, a real estate research firm. The 25.7% year-over-year increase in the median sales price was the largest since DataQuick began tracking the information in 1988.


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Note that the median price of $307,000 includes both houses and condos, and it includes all of southern California. With prices like this, that often include 50-mile-plus trips to work, no wonder people are moving to Nevada and Arizona (not that there aren't other perfectly good reasons for moving to those states).