The Bay Area's summer real estate market is becoming known as the busiest in years.
The source reports that coming off a hot June, July sales for the nine-county region Bay Area's summer real estate reached a 10-year high for that month, as deals were cut for 6,765 single-family homes.
"In terms of the activity level, it's the strongest summer market we've seen since the housing bust," the source quotes Andrew LePage, research analyst for CoreLogic, the real estate information service that crunched the numbers.
Furthermore it was also reported that among the leaders in the sales flurry were Contra Costa County with a 15.1 percent jump over July 2014, Alameda County with a 13.7 percent year-over-year leap, and Santa Clara County with an 8.6 percent increase. For the two East Bay counties, the July sales were the busiest since 2005, while Santa Clara sales represented a six-year high.
The source says that agents suggested that the sudden business reflected the frenzy of homeowners to lock in deals before the school year begins -- and perhaps more important, before mortgage rates climb, as Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen has suggested they will later this year. More affordable inland areas, including in Contra Costa, Napa and Solano counties, showed the sharpest sales gains.
There reports also mentions that LePage added historical perspective, pointing out that Bay Area sales "had been below average for years, and now we're finally getting back to normal." Last month's sales of existing single-family homes were 2.4 percent above "the long-term average for all Julys going back to 1988," when CoreLogic began collecting its data.
Lastly, sales fell down by 7.9 percent year-over-year in San Mateo County, where there typically are lesser transactions. But with that descent in sales volume comes a new high for median prices,$1,225,000 .
Elsewhere in Silicon Valley and the East Bay, however, median prices fell just enough to make some agents and buyers wonder if a seasonal cooling was on hand according to the source.
