San Diego home price starts year at $529K

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The San Diego County median home price was $529,000 in January, down by $11,000 since December, said real estate tracker CoreLogic on Tuesday.

The big picture: In a year, the median price increased 6.9 percent. San Diego County’s median home price hit an all-time high in June of $545,000. While January’s median is not far from the record, it might take a while to return to that level.

How prices could change: Rising interest rates and other factors could slow the pace of home price increases in the coming year, some experts say.

“The price is already pretty high and now you put higher interests rates on top of that,” said Alan Gin, economist at University of San Diego. “That’s going put home purchases out of reach for some people.”

The rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage was 4.52 percent Tuesday, up from around 4 percent at the end of last year, said Mortgage News Daily.

Mark Goldman, a real estate lecturer at San Diego State University, said he expected median price increases to slow as the market comes down from last year’s highs.

“The market is slowing down, in general,” Goldman said. “Prices are topping out and I don’t see a reversal. (Prices last year) were increasing at a very aggressive rate.”

Read the complete article on the San Diego Union-Tribune