Home Sales Soar 32% Over Last February

Ventura County’s real estate market continued its rebound from 1995 as February home sales jumped 32% over lackluster levels from a year before.

But after a hectic day on Wall Street that resulted in home mortgage rates surging nearly half a percentage point, economists predicted the hot housing trend would cool in the coming months.

In February, 643 homes were sold countywide, up 157 from the same period in 1995, according to a report by TRW-REDI Property Data released Thursday. The average price of a home also increased slightly, from $221,872 to $223,401.

The increase in home sales follows a modest 7.5% rise in January of this year, when 558 homes were sold around the county.

The sudden upswing in the real estate market is a welcome change after 1995, a dismal year that saw housing sales lag far behind those of 1994.

“It’s booming,” said UC Santa Barbara economist Mark Schniepp, who recently predicted a growing trend in the housing market.

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For the last five months, the climate for home sales has steadily improved, beginning in October when home sales leveled off after months of decline, Schniepp said.

Despite the sharp increase last month, TRW-REDI market research analyst Nima Nattagh said he was hesitant to conclude that the housing market had recovered.

“It’s a pretty good start to the year,” he said. “As to whether this trend will continue, we will have to wait and see.”

Although the economy has shown signs of improving, Nattagh said housing sales are still far from peak levels of past years even though interest rates have been low.

“They have helped some, but not as much as people expected,” he said. “There is still a lot of anxiety about jobs.”

Last month’s upswing was visible throughout the county, particularly in the city of Ventura, where home sales skyrocketed 79.5% compared to the same period last year.

While just 49 homes were sold in Ventura in February 1995, 88 homes were sold during the same period this year.

“You can feel it,” said Lori Jolicoeur, a broker with the Fred Sands real estate office in Ventura. “We have multiple offers on properties that have only been out three or four days . . . we didn’t experience that last year.”

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In Thousand Oaks, sales rose 28% with 129 homes sold in February compared to 101 homes during the same period last year.

Home sales increased 21% in Camarillo, up from 52 homes in February last year to 63 homes during the same time this year.

But Friday’s surge in mortgage and interest rates is bound to slow the recovering market, Schniepp said.

The nation’s economy boomed in February, producing 705,000 new jobs--the biggest monthly gain in 13 years--and slashing the unemployment rate from 5.8% to 5.5%, the Labor Department reported Friday.

That report dashed hopes that the Federal Reserve would ease interest rates any time soon and triggered a plunge in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which fell 171.24 points, or 3%, to 5,470.45, in one of its biggest single-day tumbles in history.

“I would imagine, given today’s sell-off, this is going to cool down,” Schniepp said. “Interest rates took a nasty move upward.”

At the end of the day, rates on a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage ended at or near 8%, raising monthly payments by about $70 from the previous day’s rates.

“I don’t think it is going to end the housing recovery,” Schniepp said, “but slow it a bit.”

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Ventura County House Sales

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February, 1995 February, 1996 Number Average Number Average City/ZIP code of sales price of sales price CAMARILLO 93010 30 $213,839 40 $221,218 93012 18 $265,500 20 $289,000 93066 4 $397,375 3 $168,333 FILLMORE 93015 12 $162,955 7 $155,714 MOORPARK 93021 40 $259,600 38 $241,555 OAK PARK 91301 14 $305,607 na na OAK VIEW 93022 3 $149,667 3 $147,750 OJAI 93023 15 $292,733 12 $234,955 OXNARD 93030 37 $168,384 75 $194,001 93033 26 $147,920 15 $139,400 93035 16 $230,511 26 $241,769 PIRU 93040 1 125,000 NA NA PORT HUENEME 93041 7 $159,286 16 $148,719 SANTA PAULA 93060 17 $142,088 22 $158,432 SIMI VALLEY 91307 1 $480,000 NA NA 93063 37 $184,931 59 $189,653 93065 58 $186,888 47 $214,870 THOUSAND OAKS 91320 17 $226,382 33 $254,333 91360 42 $234,071 48 $241,741 91361 14 $314,893 15 $386,267 91362 28 $343,554 33 $399,242 VENTURA 93001 14 $195,857 25 $210,841 93003 20 $192,579 32 $181,758 93004 15 $226,367 31 $221,968 COUNTYWIDE *486 $221,872 643 $223,401

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Source: TRW-REDI Property Data