Southern California August home sales drop to lowest level since 1992

Lots of early indicators are pointing toward an awful month for home sales in August. I doubt it will be confined to any one region or area given the fact the mortgage meltdown is a national event. But California bears particularly close watching given that it was one of the first markets to boom and that lenders have tons of exposure there. Anyway, the following press release just crossed: "SoCal home sales at 15-year low, prices edge down" According to DataQuick Information Systems (the source of the information) ...

* SoCal home sales (both new and existing) were just 17,755 last month. That was off a whopping 36.3% from 27,857 in August 2006.

* Things haven't been this bad in any August since 1992, when 16,379 sales were recorded. August 1992, in turn, was the worst August since DQ began tracking the market in 1988.

* For perspective sake, 39,562 homes were sold in the busiest August (2003). That means sales are down a stunning 55%. Wow.

* DataQuick says that if you adjust the house price data to account for a change in the type of homes sold, you find that prices are off about 3.5% year-over-year.