http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080513/ap_on_bi_go_ec_fi/home_prices
Median home prices drop in many cities
By MARTIN CRUTSINGER, AP Economics Writer
1 hour, 22 minutes ago
WA****NGTON - Median home prices fell in two-thirds of the cities
surveyed during the first three months of this year, a real estate
trade group re****ted Tuesday.
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The National Association of Realtors said that median prices for
existing single-family homes dropped in 100 of 149 metropolitan areas
in the January-March period, while 48 metropolitan areas saw prices
increase and one re****ted no change.
Nationally, the median home price =97 the point where half the homes
sold for more and half for less =97 fell to $196,300 in the first
quarter, down by 7.7 percent from the same period a year ago, when the
median sales price was $212,600.
The steep price decline was the latest indication of the problems
facing the housing market, which is in a prolonged slump that has
dragged down sales and home prices.
Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the Realtors, said that part of the
problem in the first three months of the year was that it was hard to
get so-called jumbo loans because of the credit squeeze triggered by
rising mortgage defaults, particularly for subprime loans, mortgages
made to borrowers with weak credit histories. Jumbo loans are critical
to finance homes in high-cost areas of the country.
"These are highly unusual results because there were very few jumbo
loan originations in the latest quarter, so sales are much slower in
high-cost areas, and at the same time foreclosures related to subprime
mortgages rose," he said.
Yun said that subprime mortgages are accounting for more than half of
all mortgage foreclosures and that sharp price declines are
principally occurring in neighborhoods where subprime loans had been
prevalent.
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