February Home Sales Increase 8% Over ’93

February home sales in Ventura County increased 8% over last year, reflecting an upward trend throughout Southern California.

But an analyst for TRW-REDI Property Data, which monitors monthly home sales, said Thursday that the county’s housing market is at best months away from full recovery.

“We have leveled off and things are gradually improving,” said Nima Nattagh, the analyst who publishes the data. “But we still need a consistent pattern like this for the next five or six months to say that the market has recovered. Then all will be well.”

Nattagh said low interest rates have spurred sales. In most Southern California counties, sales were up, while prices dropped. But in Ventura County, prices were up nearly 3%, with the average home going for $234,361.

Donna Schuepbach, a Ventura realtor with Schuepbach & Associates, which specializes in residential and mobile homes in Ventura and Oxnard, said her business has doubled since January.

“It just seems if you have a house priced right for the county, at around $200,000, it really isn’t going to be on the market very long,” she said. “Within 90 days it’s gone.”

In some areas of the county, gains were even more substantial.

“We’re up by about 20% from last February,” said Camarillo realtor Bob Boyter, who is with Jon Douglas Co.

Boyter said the combination of low interest rates, an improving market, and the number of people displaced by the earthquake and still seeking homes was responsible for the sales increase.