While some parts of California saw housing sales slow down in July, in the Bay Area it was a different story. The California Association of Realtors reports that the Bay Area continues to see prices climb ever-higher with many markets experiencing double-digit growth in closed-sale prices. Santa Clara, San Francisco, and Alameda–all counties where more than half of the homes sold were over $1 million–each saw prices rise by more than 10 percent from last year. In Contra Costa County, home prices are up 7.4 percent year-over-year with the July median at $680,000. And, sales were up by more than 10 percent.
The report notes that the “erosion of affordability continues to drive the dynamics of the housing market
in the Bay Area with the East Bay continuing to pick up sales as workers get priced out of the larger employment centers in the Peninsula and Silicon Valley.”