2009 Survey of California Home Buyers

The 2009 Survey of California Home Buyers was just released from the California Association of REALTORS. Here is an excerpt:

After back-to-back years of steep decreases in sales, annual sales in the California housing market bounced back and increased 27 percent to 439,830 in units in 2008.

The first quarter of 2009 extended the rally in sales and showed a strong performance with a seasonally adjusted annualized sales figure of 590,390, an 83 percent increase from the same quarter of 2008. Annual sales are projected to increase 25 percent to 550,000 in 2009.

The increase in sales was due in large part to the growth in the absorption of distressed properties with huge mark-down in prices. Results from the Home Buyer Survey suggest that distressed sales made up more than half of the sales in California:

• Forty-nine percent of all buyers bought a home through a regular market sale
• Thirty-eight percent bought an REO/bank-owned property
• Thirteen percent bought a short-sale property

Interested in reading more? Click on the links below to download the 2009 and 2008 surveys in PDF format:

2009 Survey of California Home Buyers (26.8 MB)

2008 Survey of California Home Buyers (9.79 MB)

2008 Survey of California Home Sellers (16.2 MB)