Hot Orange County housing: $100,000-plus price gains in 56 of 83 ZIPs

The pandemic era’s homebuying binge has created six-figure price gains in 56 of Orange County’s 83 ZIP codes.

My trusty spreadsheet, filled with Orange County homebuying stats at the neighborhood level from DQNews/CoreLogic, found in the 12 months ended in August prices rose in 77 of 83 ZIPs — 56 with gains of $100,000 or more.

The countywide median for the month of $900,000 was up 12.5% in a year. That’s a $100,000 price gain 12 months. The buying binge resulted in 3,708 closed sales of all residences — existing and new, single-family houses and condos — countywide. That’s up 5% in a year and the busiest August in four years.

The feeding frenzy added up to the number of million-dollar Orange County neighborhoods growing by 11 to 29 in the year ending in August. Yes, 35% of ZIPs countywide have seven-figure medians. There were 10 seven-figure ZIPs in August 2019.

In those seven-figure communities, 1,489 purchases were completed last month, equaling 40% of all homes sold countywide. In August of last year, 686 residences were sold in ZIPs with $1 million-plus medians, or 19% of all transactions.

At the other end of the pricing spectrum, there are only eight neighborhoods remaining with pricing below what I defined as benchmark for “reasonable” value: a median under $666,667. Yes, that’s a lot of money. But at the start of 2017, $666,667 bought you a median-priced home in Orange County.

Orange County’s “bargain” communities are down from 26 in August 2020 and 30 in August 2019.

August’s sales in these “affordable” ZIPs totaled 205 — making “bargains” 5.5% of all purchases. In August of 2020 there were 821 purchases in “bargain” ZIPs — or 23.1% of all sales.

Note: Monthly sales data for individual ZIPs can be volatile, so price data may reflect a different mix of homes that sold — not changing values. Data for all Orange County ZIPs can be found online at bit.ly/augustmedians

Here are the new members of the million-dollar club ….

San Clemente 92673: $1.36 million — up 40% in 12 months.

Huntington Beach 92649: $1.25 million — up 36%.

Irvine 92620: $1.21 million — up 34%.

Huntington Beach 92648: $1.16 million — up 16%.

Irvine 92618: $1.12 million — up 25%.

Yorba Linda 92886: $1.09 million — up 29%.

Costa Mesa 92626: $1.08 million — up 22%.

Laguna Hills 92653: $1.08 million — up 40%.

Ladera Ranch 92694: $1.05 million — up 28%.

Santa Ana 92706: $1.03 million — up 32%.

Laguna Niguel 92677: $1.01 million — up 22%.

Costa Mesa 92627: $1 million — up 18%.

And established members on the seven-figure list …

Newport Beach 92662: $3.58 million — up 111%.

Newport Beach 92661: $3.3 million — up 38%.

Newport Coast 92657: $3.15 million — up 4%.

Corona del Mar 92625: $2.9 million — up 6%.

Laguna Beach 92651: $2.65 million — up 10%.

Newport Beach 92660: $2.21 million — up 6%.

Dana Point 92624: $1.94 million — up 68%.

Villa Park 92861: $1.68 million — up 22%.

Irvine 92603: $1.6 million — up 31%.

Newport Beach 92663: $1.48 million — off11%.

Dana Point 92629: $1.4 million — up 21%.

Irvine 92602: $1.39 million — up 10%.

Los Alamitos 90720: $1.39 million — up 26%.

Seal Beach 90740: $1.31 million — up 20%.

Trabuco/Coto 92679: $1.29 million — up 29%.

San Clemente 92672: $1.21 million — off 1%.

Santa Ana 92705: $1.2 million — up 14%.

And Orange County’s sub-$666,667 ZIPs in August …

Anaheim 92801: $655,000 — up 9%.

Santa Ana 92703: $645,000 — up 23%.

Santa Ana 92707: $620,000 — up 16%.

Orange 92868: $600,000 — up 29%.

Garden Grove 92844: $570,000 — up 5%.

Stanton 90680: $531,250 — flat.

Santa Ana 92701: $469,750 — up 6%.

Laguna Woods 92637: $382,500 — up 1%.

Jonathan Lansner is business columnist for the Southern California News Group. He can be reached at jlansner@scng.com

Source: Orange County Register