April Home Sales Drop Sharply in Southern California.... (Associated Press 051606)

This all has to do with the Interest rates going up. The Interest Rates will stop the sale of a home in a heart beat. When you purchase a home and the first five years of payments that you make and you look at the statement and see that only $75-$100 went towards the principal of the Loan. This goes on for the first five years or so. The Price of Gas also stopped people from considering a home purchase. If they are like me. My Gas purchase for the month went from $150-$200, now it is $300-$475 a month, and we don't drive that much. I have a diesel truck and a Six cylender Family sedan.

The third thing that caused all this is that the US Dollar went down so much in the world that is why we have to purchase Barrels of Oil for almost $40 dollars a barrel, when we used to have the strong dollar and purchased it at $18 dollars a barrel. Now because of the reduction in the Dollar Value this is the biggest and formost problem that has caused the Home sales to drop, the Gas Prices to Sore, and Our Monthy bills to increase so much. The Euro is doing good, there will be a great number of Germans coming over for a visit to the US for Touristing, the tourist trade in the US will be a HOT commodody simply because of the weaker dollar. But now the Dollar goes weak and what does this new yahoo in the Economic chair do...He Raised The INTEREST RATE!! IDIOT...Especially with a dropping dollar value. The price of Gold Just dropped below $700. an OZ.all because of the weak dollar..

BSRancher

April home sales drop sharply in Southern California

ALEX VEIGA

Associated Press

LOS ANGELES - The number of homes sold in a six-county swath of Southern California fell in April to the lowest level for that month since 2001, a real estate research firm said Tuesday.

In all, 24,748 houses and condominiums were sold last month in Los Angeles, San Diego, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties, according to DataQuick Information Systems.

That figure was 24,120 In April of 2001.

"March and April have shown us that the boom phase of this cycle is behind us, so now it's just a question of how the cycle ends," DataQuick president Marshall Prentice said in a statement.

Last month's sales also represented a 21.3 percent drop from 31,431 in the same month last year and a 16.1 percent decline from March, DataQuick said.

That marked the steepest annual drop for April since 1995, when the figure slid 24 percent.

Southern California, which paced the nation's housing boom during the past five years, has seen home sales decline and price increases slow since last fall as mortgage rates have crept up from historic lows.

The trend continued in April, with the rate of price increases dipping to single-digit percentages in several counties that just two years ago were seeing annual appreciation exceeding 15 percent.

The median price for a home in the region was $485,000 in April, essentially flat from a revised $486,000 in March and up 9 percent from $445,000 in April 2005, DataQuick said.

The lowest price increase occurred in San Diego County, where the median price was $505,000, up 4.3 percent over April 2005.

San Bernardino County saw the highest median price hike during the month, increasing 18.4 percent to $360,000 in a possible indication that more affordable regions are drawing more buyers.

Los Angeles County's median price in April was $508,000 for an annual increase of 13.6 percent.

Orange and Riverside counties saw median home prices rise about 9 percent, while Ventura County saw a 10.4 percent hike to $584,000.

The typical mortgage payment that homebuyers in the region committed to paying in April was $2,354, up from $2,076 during the same month a year ago and $2,315 in March.