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Silicon Valley Home Prices At Record Levels As Sales Tumble

Buyers were taking their time picking over a growing crop of listings in Silicon Valley in February.

Even in a Silicon Valley market with home sales not quite as robust as they were a year ago, home prices keep breaking records.

The median single-family home price on closed sales rose to a record $765,000 in February, eclipsing the previous $760,000 record last set in June 2005.

The median condo price, also based on closed sales, rose to $515,000 in February, bypassing a record $505,000 set a month earlier, according to Richard Calhoun, broker/owner of Creekside Realty in San Jose and publisher of the Bay Area Real Estate Market Newsletter.

The report compiles statistics from the area's multiple listing service, RE InfoLink of Campbell, CA.

Calhoun said prices are key, but not because they are record breakers.

"Yes $765,000 is a record, but it was $750,000 last April and $760,000 last June. I suspect the price (for single family homes) in March will be basically unchanged and would estimate $750,000. If true, that will only be a 2 percent annual increase in prices," Calhoun said.

That's a far cry from the average 20 percent increase in the area's home prices in 2005, according to the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, but Calhoun says if sales continue to be lackluster, prices will eventually follow them down.

Closed sales on single-family homes slipped from 824 in February 2005 to 695 this February. Condo closings dropped from 355 to 324, during the same period.

"My read on the market is look at the volume of transactions compared to other Februarys. This is the second month where volume is near record low volume. That says the buyers are not buying. The question is why?" he asked.

The 2,368 listings for both single-family homes and condos in January this year, rose to 2,602 in February. Last year, February's count was only 1,533.

As average fixed mortgage interest rates on conforming 30-year loans rose from 6.23 percent to only 6.26 percent, buyers took their sweet time picking over February's growing crop of homes for sale.

Single family homes in closed sales sold in an average 45 days this February, compared to an average 34 days last February. Condos were on the market an average 43 days, more than twice as long as they were last February, 20 days.

Martin Monica, a real estate economics instructor at West Valley Community College in Saratoga says buyers are biding their time for the best deal.

"One of the things I'm seeing is the change in the leadership of the Federal Reserve. You already have an indication that [Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke] is going to up the interest rates to offset inflation and that puts everybody on a kind of guarded position to make sure they don't get into something that costs more than it should," said Monica.

His course, taught to budding real estate professionals and investors, teaches the advantages and disadvantages of a variety of real estate investments and the causes and effects of value fluctuations.

While there is trepidation about buying a home that is so expensive, buyers who remain in the market are finding ways to afford the keys to the American Dream.

"Five family members get together and buy a house. They want to live here and while they couldn't afford a home alone, as a team they can live here," said Monica, also a mortgage broker with Dream Home Realty in Santa Clara.

Despite the high prices and slowing sales, the downtown San Jose condo market is more balanced than it's been in years. A host of redevelopment-backed condo, loft and town home communities completed in recent years, have begun to shed resales into the market, helping boost the inventory.

"Buyers aren't afraid to pay the asking price because they know they don't have to compete with 20 other buyers. Sellers know they have to have attractive prices," said Jeff Hansen, a real estate consultant who specializes in the downtown condo niche market.

"In San Jose, we have one extreme or the other, so this is kind of normal," added Hansen, a real estate agent with Keller Williams in Campbell.

Hansen says, among condo buyers, he sees an equal mix of first-timers who've lived here for years, as well as relative new-comers buying high-density housing in downtown San Jose.

More expensive homes aren't moving as fast.

Often a high-end home salesperson, Stefan Walker, an associate broker with Alain Pinel in Los Gatos, advises not to expect the 18 to 40 percent home price increases that came to market last year. Ten percent or less is more realistic, depending upon the community.

Google dollars and stock earnings from other technology companies hasn't made much of a difference, as some experts had forecast.

"There's just not as much funny money out there. The upper end is going to be even softer than the bread and butter stuff. Buyers are out there, they just aren't buying at the same clip," Walker said.
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