The official February data is in and it shows one of the fastest month-over-month appreciation rates that we’ve ever seen in San Diego, surpassing even the bonkers months in Q1 and Q2 of 2022.
Sellers went on a tear last week.
I had to look back all the way to August 2022 to find the last time we had more new listings in a week.
Inventory is officially on an upward trend again.
The official February data is in and it shows one of the fastest month-over-month appreciation rates that we’ve ever seen in San Diego, surpassing even the bonkers months in Q1 and Q2 of 2022.
Combined median price for the county was up a whopping +6.3% in February, exceeding the previous peak set in May 2022 ($875k).
Detached median price jumped all the way up to $1,043,900 (up from $980k in January).
Attached median price jumped to $662,000 (up from $650k in January).
Monthly median price data can be a little noisy, especially when sales volume is so low, so as I’ve mentioned several times here before, I prefer the median price per square foot metric because it tends to even out some of that noise.
That metric still shows very healthy appreciation in February (+1.4% over January), just not the astronomical rate that the median price metric represents.
After a couple of months of softer numbers, the % to the original list price metric increased back to near 100% (99.7% to be exact).
That is likely to continue to increase based on what we’re seeing in the weekly pending data.
After a down couple of weeks, purchase mortgage applications surged 10.6% higher last week.
San Diego real estate is clearly firing on all cylinders at the moment, but there are still some red flags to keep our eyes on (other than general affordability issues).
A new potential headwind is brewing for San Diego real estate with the local labor market starting to show signs of weakness.The February employment data just came out to show a 4.7% local unemployment rate, up from 4.3% on last month’s update, and up from 3.7% one year ago. The report shows a contraction of 23,400 jobs across the county.
A weaker job market could bring about more listings (distressed sellers who can’t afford the home anymore) and cut into buyer demand (more people without jobs and less job security for those that do = fewer buyers).
How’s Brian feeling this week about the San Diego market?
Optimistic, but still playing it cautious… 🙂 (no changes from last week)
- 3-month outlook (May 2024) – inventory will increase. We’ll see another 2-3% appreciation over February.
- 6-month outlook (August 2024) – inventory will be higher than in May, and values will peak in May as usual, then flatten out and fall from there.
- 12-month outlook (February 2024) – sticking to the 5-7% range of annual appreciation for now.
Disclaimer! This is not investment advice. I might be wrong. You make your own decisions.
Other Relevant Local News
- Del Mar signs agreement to negotiate for affordable housing at fairgrounds
- Solid community support by Henish with CalHomeCo – local real estate company buys furniture store, donates it all to flood victims
