Home sales rose 27.9% from February to March, thanks largely to numerous foreclosure resales in the Inland Empire – 55% of the market. These sales took place almost entirely in affordable neighborhoods, evidenced by the fact that 37.8% of the purchase-assist loans in March were FHA- insured, more than triple the percentage from a year ago. More affluent districts, on the other hand, have yet to see a rise in sales volume.

first tuesday take: This monthly report is troubled by the median price the authors mathematically abstract from the sales numbers. Since the median price is meaningless, and should NEVER be used by anyone to justify or indicate the actual pricing of any property, readers should rely upon the analysis in this report to get into the better, tougher issues: what each segment of the home sales market – low-tier, mid-range, and high-tier, is doing with resale prices. The Dataquick report offers some insight, since MDA Dataquick has all the numbers needed to do so – enabling this report to skirt the median price issue. You should trouble yourself to read this report, and see how the experts are dealing with the massive distortion in the present median price thing.

Re: Southland home sales up; median levels off”, from Dataquick News