As the home-buying season begins, it’s time to take a look at the home sales statistics of the first four months of the year to analyze the health of the real estate market in downtown San Diego. Downtown is a unique market since the vast majority of properties are attached listings, such as condos and townhomes. Not surprisingly, there have only been two detached listings sold in this area in 2010, leaving little to be analyzed. Therefore, we’ll focus our conversation on the trends we have been seeing in attached properties being sold in the 92101 ZIP Code. Overall, homebuyers and sellers in the downtown area are seeing positive signs that the real estate market is improving along with the rest of the county. At a glance, the number of sold listings rose considerably, indicating a viable market with a lot of opportunity. Median price remains above the county average, despite a recent drop, and the average days on the market is still on par with a lot of what we are seeing throughout the county. The fluctuation we are seeing in the median price is not uncommon for high-end properties. At the start of the year, downtown saw increases in the median price in both January and February. As part of the natural cycle, March and April then saw a dip; however, the median price in the area is still $99,000 higher than the county average. The experts at the San Diego Association of REALTORS® (SDAR) do not anticipate this decrease will continue in future months since downtown’s market continues to be active, and the county as a whole has shown strong signs of improvement. The level of activity in the downtown market can be assessed by looking at the number of sold listings in the area. These numbers are up significantly month over month and in comparison to April 2009. While the entire county saw a 2.5 percent increase in the number of sold listings, the downtown area increased at a much quicker rate: 23 percent from April of 2009. This is a clear indication that real estate in this area is no longer stagnant. People are buying and selling, which puts the county well on its way to a healthy recovery. While downtown is selling far more attached properties than most other ZIP Codes in the county, they are also taking slightly longer to sell. In April, the average number of days that properties remained on the market was particularly long, at 105; however, this is unusual when compared to the previous three months. All in all, downtown is slightly above the county’s average for days on the market so far in 2010, a trend that is not uncommon among the high-priced ZIP Codes. The good news is that we expect many of these positive signs to continue. The start of May marked the beginning of the home-buying season, a time of year that the real estate market is always particularly busy. This should result in more sold listings and more competition, which hopefully will lead to an increase in median price. We also expected to see a spike in May due to the small window of opportunity that Californians had to take advantage of both federal and state tax credits. The only way to receive both was to postpone closing on your home in April in order to apply for the state tax credit in May. Since many opted to do this, we are ready to see another increase in the number of sold listings for the months of May and June. The truth is, downtown will always be a coveted place to live, so it’s likely we’ll see these positive trends continue. Mark Marquez is the president of the San Diego Association of REALTORS®.