“Home Prices Remain Steady” - Los Angeles Times

Excerpts from an aticle published 2/15/07 in the Business Section of the Los Angeles Times with the headline “Home Prices Remain Steady - The Southland median in January is $485,000, defying expectations that it would be lower”:

“Southern California housing prices held steady in January while sales declines slowed, according to data released (by Lo Jolla based research firm DataQuick Information Systems) Wednesday, prompting some experts to suggest that the local real estate downturn may be nearing a bottom.” “Meanwhile, the sales decline of 17% from a year earlier was the smallest since May. . . the volume was about average for the last two decades.”

“The market is showing much more resilience than we or anybody thought, said John Karevoll, DataQuick’s chief analyust. ” . . .  since mid-2006, median prices regionwide have leveled off and the supply of homes for sale had thinned. “We may have botttomed out and are on the way up”, said G.U. Krueger, an economist for real estate advisory firm IHP Capital Partners in Irvine”

“Last month, Los Angeles County continued to show the most strength of any local county. Its median price rose 6.1% above a year ago.”