L.A. County listing prices flat as inventory moves higher

Median listing prices in L.A. County were essentially flat over the last week, dipping by $100, as inventory of for-sale homes and condos rose by 750 homes, according to Housing Tracker's weekly analysis of MLS listings.

Numbers: Listing prices slipped to $399,900, a decline of 23.1% from year-ago levels. Inventory climbed to 42,553, a decline of 7.9% from year-ago levels.

Date              Median listing price                        Inventory

4/06               $579,666                                      27,251
4/07               $545,000                                      35,489
5/07               $545,000                                      38,297
6/07               $540,000                                      40,766 (up 20.4% y/y)
7/07               $535,000                                      42,685 (up 14.5% y/y)
8/07               $529,000                                      44,483 (up 13.6% y/y)
9/07               $520,000                                      46,414 (up 16.9% y/y)
10/07             $510,000                                      46,603 (up 15.6% y/y)
11/07             $499,900                                      46,503 (up 19.0% y/y)
12/07             $495,000 (down 10.0% y/y)           43,174 (up 28.2% y/y)
1/08               $479,900 (down 12.6%)                40,850 (up 33.3% y/y)
2/08               $475,000 (down 13.5%)                43,625 (up 38.3%)
3/08               $464,900 (down 15.5%)                42,098 (up 31.4%)
4/08               $450,000 (down 17.4%)                42,430 (up 16.7%)
5/08               $449,900 (down 17.4%)                42,532 (up 11.1%)
6/08               $440,000 (down 18.5%)                42,398 (up 4.0%)
7/08               $425,000 (down 20.6%)                44,636 (up 4.6%)
8/08              $410,000 (down 22.3%)                 42,279 (down 5.1%)
9/2/08          $400,000 (down 23.8%)                 42,081 (down 8.6%)
9/8/08           $399,999 (down  23.1%)                41,803 (down 9.9%)
9/15/08         $399,900 (down 23.1%)                 42,553 (down 7.9%)

-- Peter Viles

Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to Peter Viles

Comments

[mopar777]

This is happening up here in Sacramento too. Desperate sellers who want to avoid foreclosure are hanging on to their breakeven prices or keeping the price up in hopes of taking a better offer to the bank when asking for a short sale. Of course the last hope is to get LUCKY. It happens every day - sometimes people get what they don't deserve.

[Amazing_Happens]

BOTTOM!

[Joe]

Thanks for the chart Pete=)

[not confused]

Humans are hard-wired to loss aversion. Witness the evidence around you-- Las Vegas gamblers doubling sown on losing streaks, couples living in misery to avoid the loss of attachment relationships, the denial on Wall Street of the sliding mortgage security crisis signaling the loss of traders' and investment bankers' six figure bonuses, etc. Most human will do anything to delay or avoid loss.

And there it is on Peter's charts. Proof positive. People clinging to equity vanished long ago even as the country presently slides into what is quickly appearing to be a real 1920s-style depression.

[dclogang]

Amazing Happens has called "Bottom!"

Um.....

We are yeeeears away from the bottom.

We are in the Eye of the Hurricane.

[silverlaker]

100K knocked off in 2008 so far... another 100K to knock off in 2009

[Amazing_doesn't_happen]

FALSE BOTTOM!

[Jonah]

Someone wake me up when that bottom number hits 299K! :)

[Fourth Generation]

Bottom? Not happening until houses prices reach the low 200K. And that is not counting on the over correction of the market that no doubt will happen this time. The ride goes on and on and on and ............

[dontmatta]

I don't know if you saw these or if it's a typo, but did you notice the Orange County listings? The 25th percentile homes fell to $50,000 this week.

09/15/2008 18,548 $50,000 $479,000 $795,000
09/08/2008 18,554 $325,000 $485,000 $799,000

[OverIt]

If this is the BOTTOM then we should all be looking forward to our 25% salary increases. Bet those checks are in the mail already.....

[Bob Warren]

Median listing price continues its linear decline. A straight line fit accounts for over 98% of the variability and predicts a median list price of $375,129.90 at year's end. As before, the slope of the line is increasingly steep -- if this trend continues, the median price at year's end would be $365,070.80 instead. Quite a drop from the $579,666
value in March, 2007 when I started tracking this series.

[Amazing_Happens]

If this is the BOTTOM then we should all be looking forward to our 25% salary increases. Bet those checks are in the mail already.....

Posted by: OverIt | September 16, 2008 at 10:28 AM

The checks aren't coming in the mail ... it was already direct deposited.

[Robert]

ok, I went house hunting this weekend looking for "deals" I was looking on the westside, maybe mar vista, or culver city. An area that i assumed would be a little more affordable.

uh, well what I came to was that you are paying minimum $500 a foot for ANY properties on the westside, no matter where you are. a place in culver city is selling for the same price / sq ft as a place in westwood or up beverly glen. same price, just smaller houses. its just stupid.

no thank you.

there was a "cheap" place in culver city that was selling for the low-low price of $460 / foot that just happened to be a block away from the projects, true projects.

Give me a break. Call me at $300 / foot.

[Cynt]

still waiting....(it's all still too expensive)

[Crash and Burn]

Um, maybe someone should pick up a newspaper and read it. Do you think those guys who jumped out of the windows in 1929 thought that this was a great time to buy a house? Maybe spin wasn't as good back then.