by Calculated Risk on 9/18/2008 02:40:00 PM

From DataQuick: Bay Area home sales near bottom again, median price plunges

The pace of Bay Area home sales reversed its July uptick and dropped again last month ... A total of 7,232 new and resale houses and condos were sold in the nine-county Bay Area in August. That was down 4.7 percent from 7,586 in July, and down 0.9 percent from 7,299 in August 2007, according to San Diego-based MDA DataQuick.

Last month's sales total was the second-lowest for an August, behind 6,688 sales in August 1992, in MDA DataQuick's statistics, which go back to 1988.

The median prices declined sharply, but we have to be careful with median prices because of the mix of homes can change (many low priced homes are being sold through foreclosure):

The median price paid for all new and resale houses and condos sold in the Bay Area last month was $447,000, down 4.9 percent from $470,000 in July and down a record 31.8 percent from $655,000 in August 2007, according to MDA DataQuick.

Last month's median stood at the lowest point since January 2004, when it was $440,000. The median peaked at $665,000 in June, July and August of 2007.

Foreclosure resales are a significant portion of sales:

Across the Bay Area, foreclosure resales made up 36.1 percent of all resales last month, up from 33.3 percent in July and 4.4 percent a year ago. The figure represents the percentage of homes resold in August that had been foreclosed on at some point in the prior 12 months.

At the county level, foreclosure resales ranged from 8.6 percent of resales in San Francisco to 61.3 percent in Solano County. In the Bay Area's other seven counties, August foreclosure resales were as follows: Contra Costa, 54.4 percent; Marin, 13.5 percent; Napa, 39 percent; Santa Clara, 24.7 percent; San Mateo, 16.6 percent; Sonoma, 41.6 percent.