Sacramento Residential Stirs from the Bottom

Andrew Leonard on Salon.com reports on an article from the Sacramento Bee housing sales have taken a positive – if possibly short-term – upswing. The statistics are impressive: The first year-over-year sales gains in Sacramento in 37 months, adding up to a 26.3 percent increase over

April 2007. Sacramento County was one of the first regions in California to experience a complete housing meltdown, so signs of a revival there could be a bellwether for other hard-hit areas.

With just a couple of caveats. The bulk of the sales jump appears to be coming from “heavily discounted, bank-owned homes” — which implies that the after-effects of mass foreclosures are driving the rebound. But even more startling than the sales gain is how far median prices have plunged. Median sales prices — where half the homes sell for more and half for less — are down to Feb. 2003 levels in Sacramento County. The county’s median sales price in April fell to $232,000 — down 32 percent from a year ago and 40 percent off its Aug. 2005, high of $387,000. A 40 percent drop. If those are the kinds of numbers required to goose the market back into action, the entire economy still has a lot of pain coming.