California Housing Jumps in Sales Volume and Prices

When ever we see a peak in home values naysayers are quick to taunt the bubble is about to pop. Well, despite talks of housing inventory shortages, sales volumes and prices surged in June this year. The California Association of Realtors reports monthly on these figures but surges have been prevalent as of late.

The number of single family home sales jumped to 433,150 in June up 3% from May 2017 and up 2.4 over June last year. Median home prices in Calfornia hit $555,150 in June, a figure .09% over May and a whopping 7% over June 2016.

Well, the bubble just got a bit bigger, and JP Morgan sees low risk of this status correcting or popping anytime soon. The financial juggernaut looked at sales data going back to 1950 in the US and thirteen other developed countries and found that "sustained increases in real house prices have been the norm rather than the exception." 

Sure we see occasional large drops like we did in 2006 but that is not common place even after periods of steady increases. Forecasting models predicted only a 10% chance of a decline in home values within the next five years.  

The bottom line, if you are thinking of selling and concerned about the value of what you would buy next, it will only be more expensive in a few years, if you are looking to buy, do it sooner than later, waiting it out is not a strategy proven by scientific data going back almost seventy years.