Housing Trends 2016: Average Prices Surge In Southern California, NYC And Nationwide

Housing prices in Southern California rose sharply this November compared with 2015, the Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday, citing data from real estate-focused firm CoreLogic. Prices in the six-county area have now grown every month, year-to-year, for four years straight.

A median priced home cost $465,000 in Southern California this November, up 5.9 percent from last year. Prices went up in every county. In Los Angeles county, the median price climbed 8.4 percent, the largest rise of any of the six Southern California counties, to $530,000. The most expensive homes overall were in Orange County, with the median price rising 5.9 percent to $660,000.

Sales in Southern California were up a staggering 24.1 percent. However, that could largely be attributed to new lending regulations last year that slowed down many November deals that would have otherwise closed, according to CoreLogic.

Southern California is hardly the only area in the country where housing prices have shot up. Amid an increase in sales of super-luxury condos, the average apartment in New York City's Manhattan borough now costs some $2 million. The median apartment in the borough cost $1.2 million, even as rental prices have begun to decline.

Housing prices nationwide also hit a new high this October, according to monthly figures from the S&P/Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index. Prices were up 5.6 percent compared to last October, but analysts expected the rise in prices to eventually level off, reported CNBC Tuesday. Prices haven't risen like this since the housing bubble in the mid-2000s, although Svenja Gudell, chief economist at Zillow, said the current situation isn't similar to that period, according to CNBC.

"The growth we're seeing today is, instead, a natural reaction to basic economic fundamentals," she said. "More and better opportunities for American consumers means high demand for housing, and that demand is not being met by an adequate supply of homes for sale — and so prices rise."