BY BRIAN HAMILTON – Realtor/Co-owner Betsy Hamilton Real Estate Team
It wasn’t by a wide margin, but western Nevada County home sales squeaked past prior year, despite the weakest December sales in nearly a decade.
According to Multiple Listing Service data, there were 87 homes sold in the local market last month, a 14.7% decline from December 2023. That brought the year-end total to 1,135 closings, slightly up from the 1,118 recorded in 2023.
Seventeen more homes sold in western Nevada County than one year earlier.
Not a significant increase in numbers but the first annual bump seen since 2021, a record-breaking year in sales amid the pandemic.
Consecutive slides in sales followed the next two years, with 2022 dropping 13.9% from a high of 1,739 homes sold to 1,498 in 2022. Total transactions took another dramatic dip in 2023, falling a full quarter percent — 25.4% — to 1,118 homes sold.
In all, 2024 total sales were 36.5% off from the record run in 2021.
MEDIAN PRICE
The median price of a western Nevada County home sold in the final month of 2024 was $532,500, a 2.5% decrease from November and just less than a percentage point higher than the same month last year, at $527,500.
According to the MLS, the median price for a home sold locally hit an all-time high of $592,500 in April of 2022. It was recorded in the white-hot market amid a national home-buying frenzy fueled by the coronavirus pandemic.
That price was pushed to new heights at a time when there were 150 homes sold and another 192 pending sales were on the book. There were 339 homes listed for sale, far from the western Nevada County norm at that time of year, but quite a robust inventory following a 2021 market that saw homes sell so quickly that listings ever reached 300 in a single month.
For context, the median price of a home sold in western county was $418,000 in January 2020.. By the end of the year, and in the thick of the full-on sales frenzy, the median price had risen to $505,000 in December 2020, a 21% increase over what buyers paid just 12 months earlier.
The record high median of $592,500 in April 2022 represented a 41.7% increase over the $418,000 median price recorded just weeks prior to the pandemic.
DAYS ON MARKET
The median days it took for a home seller to accept a buyer’s offer in December was 41 days, a 57.7% increase over the prior month. Although this market indicator sometimes proves volatile with a low volume of sales in a small market, the median days on market ranged as low as 12 days in April and as high as 44 days in January.
December 2023 also saw a median days on market of 41 days, while the rest of the year saw a range of 13 days in May as the low and 63 days as the high in January.
In January 2020, the median days on market rose as high as 83 days. In December of 2021, the median days totaled 18. Just months earlier, the median had hit an all-time low of eight days, one of three straight months in the single digits between April-June.
STATEWIDE
According to the California Association of Realtors data, December saw the largest increase in home sales statewide since June 2021. Meanwhile the median price of a home sold in California grew for the 18th consecutive month, recorded at $861,000.
The median days on market for a home to sell in California was 31 days in December 2024.
“California’s housing market ended the year with a positive note with home sales reaching the highest level in five months,” said association President Heather Ozur, a Palm Springs Realtor. “With mortgage rates remaining at their highest level since early July and devastating wildfires taking a toll on the Southern California housing market, we’ll likely have a slow start for the year, but demand should pick up once we enter the spring homebuying season.”
Looking ahead to 2025, industry experts say they expect an improved market, but a variety of variables make forecasting difficult.
“As projected, both sales and price activity were up modestly in 2024 as California wrapped up the year with a double-digit sales gain over last December,” said association Senior Vice President and Chief Economist Jordan Levine. “While the housing market is expected to improve further in 2025, stickier-than-expected inflation, the ongoing insurance crisis, and policy changes under the new White House administration are some of the hurdles that could present challenges for the market in the upcoming year.”
Brian Hamilton is a Realtor (DRE #02149112) for the Betsy Hamilton Real Estate Team at RE/MAX Gold (DRE #01949144) in Grass Valley. Email him at br***@be***********.com or visit www.BetsyHamilton.com for more information.
