Economic Straight Talk

Bay Area Luxury Home Sales Doubled in February

Bay Area Luxury Home Sales Doubled in February

Executive Summary:

  • Sales of Bay Area homes priced above $3 million doubled in February, with most local regions posting large gains.
  • Sales of homes priced higher than $1 million also continued to grow.
  • Regionally, East Bay sales slowed, while Silicon Valley and the Wine Country saw more sales this February.
  • The Bay Area median price jumped another 16 percent year over year, though high-end sales drove a large part of the increase.
  • Buyer demand is not abating amid market challenges. Seven in 10 Bay Area homes sold for more than asking price, with the average premium increasing to 12 percent, up from 8 percent premiums observed in the last two Februarys.
  • Thirty-year, fixed-rate mortgages reached 4.46 percent as of March 8, 2018 according to a Freddie Mac survey, the highest since the spring of 2014.