Home prices in Southern California continued to rise in May, but sales have begun to slow due to growing inventory and affordability issues, according to San Diego real estate data firm DataQuick. The median price paid for all new and existing houses and condos sold in the six-county region last month was $410,000, more than 11 percent higher than the $368,000 median price a year earlier. That price is only about 1.5 percent higher than the prior month and represents the highest price since January 2008 when it hit $415,000. However, the pace of buying has slowed. Some 19,500 new and existing houses and condos were sold in May, down 15 percent from last year and more than 2 percent since April. “We expected rising prices to unlock more inventory this spring and that’s happened. But the supply of homes for sale still falls short of demand in many markets, contributing to a rise in prices and a below-average sales pace,” DataQuick analyst Andrew LePage said in a statement. “The drop in affordability has also hampered activity, helping to explain how sales could be lower now even though today’s inventory is higher than a year ago. The region includes Ventura, San Bernardino, Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Diego counties.
