Here's one thing you can take from the latest housing statistics: The $250,000 house is where it's at.
In fact, you can easily buy for less.
Almost half the new and existing homes that closed escrow during March in Sacramento County sold for $247,000 or less, according to figures released Thursday by DataQuick Information Systems of La Jolla.
That's the lowest median sales price in Sacramento County since May 2003. Yuba County saw median sales prices fall below $200,000 for the first time since January 2004. The Sacramento Association of Realtors also reported that homes priced under $180,000 accounted for 23.3 percent of March sales in Sacramento County and West Sacramento.
These numbers confirm the obvious: After more than 15,000 foreclosures since January of last year in the capital region, bank repossessions have become the house of choice for investors and first-time buyers.
Bank-owned homes now account for more than half of real estate sales in El Dorado, Placer, Sacramento and Yolo counties, said Mike Lyon, head of Sacramento-based Lyon Real Estate and the research firm TrendGraphix.
"What's happening is a feeding frenzy right now," he said. Lyon said there are nearly 3,000 homes in escrow in the four-county region this week as banks price homes to sell fast.
Such deals have helped produce a trend not usually seen this time of year: The inventory of homes for sale, which typically rises in the spring, fell to 13,116. The number has fallen every month since it hit a high of 16,262 last August.
Analysts also say that many individual sellers, wary of competing with bank-owned properties, are electing not to put their homes on the market.
The increased selling, coupled with the drop in inventory and slowing monthly declines in sales, has led some observers to say they can see very early signs that a bottom may finally be forming in the housing market. By late summer, they say, the signs of the market's direction will be clearer.
Still, the figures released Thursday show that, for now, housing remains in the grip of a fierce downturn.
DataQuick reported Thursday that 2,522 buyers closed escrow during March in Amador, El Dorado, Nevada, Placer, Sacramento, Sutter, Yolo and Yuba counties. That was up from 2,162 closings during February, but it wasn't the usual spring leap.
DataQuick analyst Andrew LePage said that like most of California, the Sacramento market saw "about half the increase we usually do between February and March. You're supposed to burst out of the winter doldrums, not merely accelerate," he said.
Sacramento County's March closings were up 19.3 percent from February; the county's 20-year average for that seasonal jump is 36.5 percent.
Among other things, bank-owned bargains have siphoned business from home builders. DataQuick reported year-over-year sales of new homes in March were down 35.6 percent in Sacramento County, down 42 percent in Placer County and down more than 70 percent in Sutter and Yuba counties.
John and Toni Daniels of Sacramento are among those who scored a foreclosure deal.
"Ours is a Countrywide repo," said John Daniels, now in escrow for a house in Elk Grove priced below $250,000. The Danielses watched the market for more than a year and a half before climbing off the fence to buy.
Their 1,935-square-foot purchase with a three-car garage, pool and spa was once priced at almost $400,000, said Daniels, who supervises a Woodland shipping facility. They plan to move in early next month.
Among DataQuick's March highlights:
• Sacramento County's 1,501 closings on new and existing homes were the fewest since March 1997. The tally was down 14 percent from the same time last year. Median sales prices are now 36 percent below August 2005 highs of $387,000.
• Placer County's 464 closings were the lowest since March 1996, and were nearly one-third less than the same time last year. The county's $355,000 March median sales price is down 19 percent from a year ago and off one-third from the August 2005 high of $525,000.
• El Dorado County's median sales price dipped in March to $362,250, down 21 percent from the same time last year.
• Yolo County's March median sales price fell to $327,500, down 16 percent from a year ago.
• The eight-county region was home to 6,652 closed escrows and nearly 5,600 foreclosures during the first three months of 2008, according to DataQuick and Foreclosures.com, a Fair Oaks-based Web site for real estate investors.
That means banks will have plenty more homes to put on the market. DataQuick's LePage said the banks have sold only about 40 percent of the homes they repossessed in the region from July to December 2007.
Call The Bee's Jim Wasserman, (916) 321-1102. Read his Home Front blog at www.sacbee.com/blogs.
