Home sales in Southern California in April ticked down from a year earlier while the region's median home price jumped more than 15 percent over the same time as the area's housing market marked more small steps toward recovery, a report by MDA DataQuick said on Tuesday.

Sales of new and resale homes totaled 20,299 in Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties last month, down 0.9 percent from March and down 1.0 percent from a year earlier, the report by the real estate information service said.

The median price paid for a home in April in California's most populous region was $285,000, the same as in March and up 15.4 percent from a year earlier, the report added.

(Reporting by Jim Christie, Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

Los Angeles California