SINGLE-FAMILY MEDIAN VALUE HITS $632,000 IN FEBRUARYFor all those waiting for a home-price ``bubble'' to explode: It hasn't happened yet. The median price of Bay Area houses that sold in February was nearly 20 percent higher than it was a year earlier, reaching a new record of $569,000 paid for resale single-family houses. Santa Clara County also posted a record, with a median house price last month of $632,000. That's up 20.4 percent from February 2004, according to DataQuick Information Systems, which compiled the figures from public records of completed sales. Condominium prices rose as well. The median price paid for condos in Santa Clara County last month was $411,000, up 19.1 percent from February 2004. For the nine-county Bay Area, the median condo price was $427,000. Real estate agents say the number of homes for sale in Santa Clara County has risen in recent weeks. But the pace of sales doesn't seem to have slowed, and sellers frequently get multiple offers. Robert Aldana, an agent with Intero Real Estate in Los Gatos, tells a typical tale: He listed a two-bedroom condo on Blossom Hill Road in San Jose for $309,950, and a week later got offers from 16 potential buyers. The home will sell for ``quite a bit over,'' he said. The condo market is even hotter than the single-family market, said Richard Calhoun of Creekside Realty in San Jose. At the current pace, the supply of Santa Clara County condos on the market this week would sell out in 16 days. It would take three weeks to sell out the supply of houses. As of Wednesday, 1,705 houses and condos were for sale in the county. That's up from 1,490 early in March. Vivian Wang, a Coldwell Banker agent in Cupertino, said homes there are often selling for 5 percent to 15 percent more than their asking prices. The Cupertino school district is such a big draw for buyers that multiple offers are commonplace, even for unremarkable homes. Wang said all of her listings this year have sold within a week, and many were on the market that long only to give buyers a chance to tour them. ``If we were taking offers as they come, we would have sold all of them in a day or two,'' she said. ``That's the reality.'' Sri Deekshitulu and his wife bought a house in Cupertino in December for $790,000, but faced no other potential buyers because the home was in such poor condition. Deekshitulu, 40, had the home gutted and remodeled before moving in last month. After buying the house, he sold his townhouse near De Anza College, and was surprised to get eight or nine offers on the 1,003-square-foot home, which was listed at $479,000. The home sold for more, but Deekshitulu declined to name the figure. As a seller, Deekshitulu said he was happy with the profit he made. But he empathizes with buyers, and said he hopes he never has to buy another home in the valley. ``Prices are really out of control, if I look at it as a buyer,'' he said. ``For a buyer, it's really painful. It's become a nightmare.'' Sales volume rose slightly in February compared with a year earlier. A total of 7,463 new and resale houses and condos sold in the nine Bay Area counties last month, up 0.7 percent. ``We're somewhat surprised that sales are as strong as they are,'' said John Karevoll, an analyst with DataQuick. ``We all were hearing about the lack of supply, and we thought they'd come in lower. And frankly, we thought the weather would be a bigger factor,'' he added, referring to the heavy rains of late December and January. Sales initiated then typically are represented in the February closed-sales data. ``If there was indeed deferred activity because of that weather, we're probably looking at a strong March and April,'' he said. |