South Bay Resale Activity for November 2006

Sorry this has taken so long. I had to bite the bullet and start reverse engineering some of this price data because numbers were seriously drifting. I assume this happens because the numbers that DQ News publishes in the L.A. Times are actually preliminary numbers. The final numbers do not get published, and we aren't aware of the changes until a year later, when we see %YOY values drift. For this reason, the %YOY change charts display the RAW %YOY numbers, so you can match them with the Dataquick values.

According to the DQNews listings in the L.A. Times, the November monthly resale activity for the south bay area showed the following:

Zip       # SFR   Median   %Chg   # Condo  Median    %Chg 
          Sales   $SFR      YOY    Sales   $Condo     YOY
90045      17     725,000  -9.3     n/a        n/a    n/a
90245       3     845,000  10.1      3     535,000  -17.7      
90254       5   1,260,000   0.8     12     820,000   11.4  
90260      12     518,000  12.5      5     345,000   19.0
90266      25   1,360,000 -26.3      5   1,100,000  -31.3
90277      20     978,000   2.9     23     725,000   17.0 
90278      26     763,000  -6.9     25     674,000   -3.1

County  5,167     540,000   2.9  1,277     410,000    0.7

Keep an eye on the dark purple lines in the median price charts and the bright pink lines in the %YOY change charts. Those are derived from moving averages. The herky-jerky month to month change in prices is enough to make anybody cross-eyed. The moving averages do a better job of illustrating the trend.

There is another data issue here, and that is having to deal with small numbers (in terms of sales). Notice how smooth the Los Angeles county median price lines are compared to those for individual zip codes - it's because the county charts are derived from infinitely more data!

A third issue here is the "sale bias." Even if prices are trending up, what does that say about the value of comparable properties in a zip code that remain unsold? Despite the drops in "official" inventories in these beach city zip codes, the fact remains that many would-be homesellers remained frustrated because they were unable to get their dream asking prices.

I'm noticing more rentals in my neighborhood now(North Redondo - Villas North). And yes, some of these are from homesellers who have given up trying to sell their homes - despite pricing their homes for "quick sale."

Beach city zip codes are 90245, 90254, 90266, 90277, 90278.