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Here's another example of the rich/not-so-rich divide: A total of 22,529 California homes sold last year for $1 million or more, up 21 percent from 2009 - and the first time that this category rose in five years, according to Dataquick. The increase compares with a 9 percent drop in total home sales. These numbers aren't all that surprising considering that the recovery has been led, in large part, by higher-end income earners (sales of luxury goods have rebounded quite well). From press release:
"Prestige home buyers respond to a different set of motivations than the rest of us. Their decisions are less dependent on jobs, prices and interest rates, and more on how their portfolio is doing. When the financial world was full of uncertainty a couple of years back, and the jumbo loan market dried up, luxury sales plummeted. As the economy started its top down recovery, some wealthy buyers went looking for a bargain," said John Walsh, DataQuick president.
Here's how it breaks out:
--463 homes sold for more than $5 million
--304 were in the $4-$5 million range
--782 were in the $3-$4 million range
--2,333 were in the $2-$3 million range
--the rest - nearly 79 percent - sold for between $1 million and $2 million.
The most expensive purchase was a 35,378-square-foot, 15-bedroom, 7-bathroom Bel Air house that went for $50 million. As for communities, based on Zip code, number of $1-million homes sold and most expensive:
90266 Manhattan Beach 326 $6.30 mill.
94010 Hillsborough 323 $8.25 mill.
90049 Brentwood 289 $14.20 mill.
95014 Cupertino 282 $3.10 mill.
95070 Saratoga 282 $5.00 mill.
90272 Pacific Palisades 263 $26.08 mill.
90210 Beverly Hills 256 $29.82 mill.
92660 Newport Beach 254 $5.46 mill.
94025 Menlo Park 254 $5.30 mill.
92037 La Jolla 252 $10.00 mill.
90274 Rolling Hills Estates 245 $5.50 mill.
92651 Laguna Beach 244 $16.75 mill.
94024 Los Altos 243 $4.75 mill.
94022 Los Altos 218 $6.15 mill.
91302 Calabasas 196 $13.00 mill.
92130 Del Mar 188 $5.10 mill.
92657 Newport Beach 185 $14.50 mill.
94539 Fremont 182 $2.60 mill.
94306 Palo Alto 181 $2.97 mill.
95120 San Jose 179 $3.50 mill.
94941 Mill Valley 170 $5.50 mill.
90265 Malibu 167 $36.97 mill.
92625 Corona Del Mar 166 $34.12 mill.
90275 Rancho Palos Verdes 164 $4.85 mill.
94566 Pleasanton 163 $3.90 mill.
Mark Lacter created the LA Biz Observed blog in 2006. He posted
until the day before his death on Nov. 13, 2013.