Median Home Prices Jump in Riverside County

RIVERSIDE COUNTY, CA - The median price of a home in Riverside County rose by 8 percent in December, compared with the same month a year earlier, while the number of homes sold inched up by 0.8 percent, a real estate information service announced Tuesday.

According to CoreLogic, the median price of a Riverside County home was $345,750 last month, up from $320,000 in December 2015. A total of 3,523 homes were sold in the county, up from 3,496 during the same month the previous year.

A total of 20,454 new and resale houses and condos changed hands in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino and Orange counties last month, according to CoreLogic. That was up 4.7 percent from 19,534 in November but down 2.9 percent from 21,069 in December 2015.

The median price of a Southern California home was $470,000 in December, up 1.1 percent from $465,000 in November and up 6.8 percent from $440,000 in December 2015.

"Southern California home sales in December 2016 fell on a year-over- year basis for the first time since last summer, but there's a caveat," said Andrew LePage, research analyst with CoreLogic. "The number of deals recorded in December 2015 was artificially high, the result of then-new federal mortgage rules that caused delays for many transactions that normally would have closed the prior month. December 2015 also had one more business day for recording deals compared with December 2016.

Those factors outweighed whatever boost December 2016 sales got from the presidential election, which reportedly resulted in an initial surge in purchase mortgage applications as rising mortgage rates spurred some on-the- fence buyers to jump into the housing market before rates could edge higher."

— City News Service / Image via Shutterstock