Polliwog Park.. Manhattan Beach

Last week I was asked to provide year over year information for 2009 first quarter home sales in all areas of Manhattan Beach. It was not a big surprise that the volume of 2007 sales was significantly higher then either 2008 or 2009. Nor was it a surprise to see that 2009 prices compared to 2008 prices are down by about 24%. However there were a couple of surprises that I didn't expect.

Surprise #1... The median price for 2008 was higher then the 2007 figure by about 8%. Surprise # 2...The 2007 median price and the 2009 price difference shows a 12% decline ... Surprise # 3... The number of sales in the 1st quarter of 2008 compared to 2009 is only off by 10 sales.

I broke the numbers out for West of Sepulveda and East of Sepulveda. The picture that emerges is very interesting. While West of Sepulveda seems to have been hit far harder then East of Sepulveda. While the volume east of Sepulveda is down prices have actually held fairly steady. West of Sepulved however got trounced in 2009. Median prices have taken a nose dive compared to 2007 and 2008.

Inventory is up west of Sepulveda. There has been a rather large increase in the upper end homes over $4,000,000 and not many sales. There are 143 homes and 28 townhomes for sale west of Sepulveda. In east Manhattan there are 47 homes and 20 townhomes on the market. That's a very big difference in inventory.

March saw 21 sales per the MLS... 16 homes and 5 townhomes. Pending numbers look a bit better with 43 properties in escrow... 33 of them in March. 4 homes and 2 townhomes have closed escrow since April 1, 2009 . While these numbers are better then February, sales are still slow. It will take a little time to see if the return of Jumbo loans at lower fixed rates makes a difference in sales.

UPDATE: 04/06/2009

Using the above changes I'm now showing 28 sales for WOS for Quarter 1....

The 28 amended sales and the 9 other items not equal the 41 sales noted on the MLS..