The Huntington Harbor real estate market, found in the Newport Beach region of Orange County, California, saw a decline in the most recent tracking period along with much of Southern California. An August 18, 2010 article from the Los Angeles Times noted that "The median price for all new and resale single-family homes, condominiums and town homes in July in Southern California was $295,000, according to MDA DataQuick of San Diego. Although that was a 1.6% drop from June, it represented a 10% increase from a year earlier, the real estate research firm said Tuesday. Year-over-year price increases have occurred throughout 2010, with the exception of a 1% dip in April. But such advances will be harder to come by in future months, DataQuick analyst Andrew LePage said. Median prices — the point at which half the homes sold for more and half for less — were depressed early last year by a glut of distressed sales in cheaper inland markets, then moved up in later months as sales activity spread to wealthier neighborhoods...A total of 18,946 homes were sold in the six-county region, a 20.6% drop from the previous month and a decline of 21.4% from July 2009, DataQuick said...About 34% of resales of existing homes involved foreclosed properties, compared with 33% in June and 43.4% in July 2009 in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego and Ventura counties. Foreclosure sales have been flat for the last few months, LePage said."
This negative trend for Huntington Harbor homes for sale was also true for the larger Southern California region as a whole. According to an August 24, 2010 report from the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, "According to MDA DataQuick, Southern California home sales saw their biggest drop in more than two years as the market lost most of the boost from the federal homebuyer tax credits. MDA DataQuick monitors real estate activity in markets across the country. Home sales have been in decline since April when a federal tax credit of $8,000 for first-time buyers and a $6,500 for repeat buyers expired. Arlette Lyons, a real estate instructor at Mt. San Antonio College, said the expiration was "detrimental to the real estate market."