Hollister
– Median home prices in San Benito County continue to rise and
some experts predict that even an influx of new homes during the
next few years might not reverse that trend.
Hollister – Median home prices in San Benito County continue to rise and some experts predict that even an influx of new homes during the next few years might not reverse that trend.
The median home price, which indicates half of the properties on the market cost more and half cost less, is $670,000 in San Benito County, said Dee Brown, a broker associate with ReMax Platinum Properties in Hollister. That number is up nearly 20 percent compared last May. At this time last year, the median home price leveled off at $575,000, up nearly $50,000 from a record-breaking $529,000 six months earlier. In 2003, the median price hovered around $388,000.
However, the most interesting development in the county’s real estate market is the average number of days it takes to sell a home, Brown said. Wednesday’s average was 32 days, with a range from one day to more than one year. Last year, the average number of days was about 19.
“That’s what has really changed this year,” Brown said. “Last year we saw multiple offers on the same home and sellers didn’t have to negotiate at all, but this year is different.”
It takes longer to sell homes this summer because more homes are on the market, Brown said. As for buyers and sellers, no one has an advantage.
“It’s not a buyer’s or a seller’s market,” Brown said. “It’s all supply and demand and it’s really a very neutral market.”
Although the median price is up significantly from this time last year, more homes are on the market this summer than in 2005, Brown said. As of Wednesday, 286 homes were available throughout the county compared to 101 last year. Of the 286 homes available the market, about 18 percent are listed at over $1 million, Brown said.
With a price of $348,000, the least expensive home in the county is local on Hazel street in Hollister. At the opposite end of the spectrum, the most expensive home, on San Juan Canyon Road, is listed at $10 million.
Local real estate experts have long-predicted home prices to drop following the anticipated end of the city’s building moratorium in 2008, but Brown said she wasn’t so sure.
“There’s no bubble to burst,” she said. “Medium income housing prices won’t change too much because it’s such a stable market.”
Even with the proposed construction of 13,000 new homes countywide in the coming years, prices won’t automatically plummet, said Karl Skow, the director of the California Association of Mortgage Brokers.
“I’d be hard pressed to believe that prices will drop, but all that new construction is still far in the future,” he said. “Who knows what could happen in the next three or four years.”
House hunters won’t have as much buying power this summer after the Federal Reserve’s decision on Wednesday to increase its federal funds rate by one-quarter percentage point to 5 percent. Wednesday bump marked the 16th increase of that size since the Fed began to tighten credit in June 2004. Before the 16 increases, the funds rates had been sliced to a 46-year low of 1 percent to help the economy recover from the bursting of the stock market bubble, a recession and terror attacks.
But the increase might not have a large impact on local home prices and the interest rates buyers pay, Skow said.
“Normally it’s short-terms rates, like credit cards, that are affected,” he said. “Long-term rates are stable, but you have less buying power and higher payments if your in the market for a home.”
Brett Rowland covers public safety for the Free Lance. He can be reached at 831-637-5566 ext. 330 or [email protected].
