SD Housing Market Bouncing Back: Report

Foreclosure activity for the second quarter of 2012 was the lowest in five years

San Diego's housing market has bottomed and has experienced modest sustainable growth.

That's according to Mark Goldman at the SDSU School of Business. His perspective follows Tuesday's news that Goldman Sachs is seeing signs of a "strong" housing recovery.

"We're seeing stabilization of prices," Goldman said. "We're seeing price increases at a moderate rate which is a good thing."

He made the comments after a flurry of positive data on the housing market.

Real Estate website Zillow.com said home values have increased for four straight months.

Numbers from research firm Dataquick showed foreclosure activity for the second quarter of 2012 was the lowest in five years.

Many neighborhoods in San Diego have experienced very low inventories which have led to multiple offers on homes around the county.

"The pain is kind of over with," Goldman said. "And now we're returning to a time where most of the market participants are more stabilized with regard to their income and with regard to their economic outlook."

Market conditions have benefitted Margaret Atmore who sells new homes in the Mesa Del Sol community in La Mesa. Available for sale since December 2011, Atmore said she was selling one every month. But in the past 8 weeks, those numbers have increased.

"Gosh, we're going to have four-a-month here, so I'm running out of inventory," she said.

Mesa Del Sol homes were selling for roughly $540,000 with 2,500-square-feet of space. A tough price point for some, said Atmore.

She said her clients have also seen success in the real estate market.

"They're able to sell their home now. I've had a couple contingencies removed from their homes and now they're ready to move forward with us," Atmore said.

Nine of ten homes in Phase two of the development have already sold, prompting developer Zephyr Partners to start selling six more houses for Phase three.

The development exhibited perhaps the most important aspect of a housing recovery. At the hilltop La Mesa site, a flurry of construction activity filled the properties. Workers in diggers, bulldozers and dump trucks were hard at work preparing plots of land for foundations.

"We've hired a thousand temporary workers at our sites in the county," said Zehpyr Partners' Brad Termini.

"The hardest hit areas of the workforce have been in construction. When that comes back, there's going to be more consumption, more people buying more stuff and that's what makes our economy move," said Goldman
 

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