Solano Real Estate Scene: What’s median home price?

The median price is the point at which half of homes sold for more and half for less. The Bay Area broke a record in April with a median price over the nine counties of $850,000, up 13.3 percent from April 2017, according to Core Logic. Solano County came it at $420,000, up 6.9 percent from April 2017. Napa and Sonoma, the next most affordable counties, came in at $609,000 and $610,000, making Solano County by far the most affordable Bay Area county. Core Logic analyst Andrew LePage said in a press release that “this subtle shift in the market mix, where a higher share of sales is occurring in the mid- to high-priced areas is in part because of the especially thin inventory of homes for sale in the more affordable areas, frustrating many first-time homebuyers.” Holy cow, the median price in San Mateo County and San Francisco is a tie at $1.32 million, which surprised the heck out of me because San Mateo includes Daly City, San Bruno, South City, Pacifica and Redwood City, all of which were considered middle class, affordable areas in 1989 when I left Pacifica for Vacaville. I mean, who can afford to buy a 1,200-square-foot house on a 3,500-square-foot lot for $1.3 million? We, in Solano County, need to help builders figure out a way of building the old 1,260-square-foot, three-bedroom, two-bath starter home again like they built from 1950 to 1995. My friends in the builder business tell me that it costs nearly $100,000 in permit fees and up-front costs before they even pour a foundation, making it impossible to make a profit on smaller, more affordable homes. They need to build large homes that they can sell for way above the median just to make a small profit. I have no solutions, but we are short more than 2 million houses in California and we need some smart people to figure it out.