As noted in the last couple monthly housing reports, we are starting to see some significant regional divergences in condo price movements. While the countywide median condo price is still slightly positive for the year, a full 25% of all San Diego zip codes have seen year-over-year condo price declines of 5% or more. So which areas are declining, and which are still hanging on? And what do they have in common?
Not a whole lot, I’m afraid. Have a look at the 10 worst-performing resale condo markets for August*:
Worst San Diego Resale Condo Markets , August 2005
* Statistical notes: I used resale data in order to remove the effects of new, low-priced condo conversions being bought directly from developers. Also, in order to remove some of the noise, I only counted zip codes that had 3 or more sales during both 8/04 and 8/05.
There’s not a whole lot of rhyme or reason to the above list. We’ve got coastal and inland zips, and everything from lush La Jolla to low-end La Mesa. There is some noise in this data, due to the small sampling sizes involved, so once the trends really start to assert themselves we may see some clearer patterns. For now, though, losing condo markets are a mixed bag.
How about the winners?
Best San Diego Resale Condo Markets , August 2005
Clearly there is a bias towards more expensive zip codes on this list. The loser’s list contains 6 sub-$400k zip codes, whereas the winner’s list contains only 3. And while only 2 over-$500k zip codes grace the loser’s list, the winner’s list sports 4 such zip codes. Nonetheless, when removing Coronado from the averages (up 50%… that would be the aforementioned “noise” in action), we see that there isn’t a huge difference in price when averaging across the lists.
So while it appears that the more expensive zip codes are doing a bit better than their lower-priced brethren, there is no common theme asserting itself strongly. I will revisit this topic in the future to see if a pattern begins to emerge as the market worsens.