If you think it is tough for buyers here...
"How expensive?” tracks measurements of California’s totally unaffordable housing market.
The pain: Orange County home prices are rising at the fastest pace in the nation, and you can blame the high-end buyer for that.
The source: My trusty spreadsheet reviewed home price indexes from First American Data & Anaytics for 30 US cities as of May, including five in California. The yardsticks have a curious twist – tracking appreciation by breaking the markets into three price slices: starter homes, mid-tier and luxury residences.
The pinch
Overall, Orange County prices rose 10.5% in the past 12 months, the No. 1 gain of the 30. That was driven by a 12.3% jump for luxury homes – also No. 1 among the 30 markets.
The county also had a 10.9% increase for its mid-section market (No. 2) but “only” a 8.3% rise for the starter segment (No. 6).
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Clearly, there are a lot of deep-pocketed buyers looking at Orange County’s more-expensive housing.
This is a different pattern than the nation overall, where house hunters bid up the lower-priced residences.
The median overall gain for the 30 US cities was 4.2% with increases of 3.9% for luxury vs. 4.1% in the middle and 4.6% for the most affordable housing."
From the Orange County Register.
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"No one is more hated than he who speaks the truth." Plato
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