Housing tracker: A slowdown in the Southern California market for homes and rentals

The Southern California housing market is downshifting.

The average home price in the six-county region fell 0.3% from October to $869,288 in November, according to Zillow, marking the fourth consecutive month of declines.

“There is really no urgency from buyers,” said Mark Schlosser, a Compass agent in the Los Angeles area. “They are waiting.”

Prices are now 1.3% off their all-time high in July, but some economists say prospective home buyers and sellers shouldn’t expect home values to plunge — one reason behind the shift is the market typically slows in the fall and prices are still above where they were a year ago.

Still, more homes are hitting the market and mortgage interest rates remain high, creating a situation of slightly more supply and slightly less demand.

As a result, annual price growth has slowed. Last month, Southern California home prices were 4.3% higher than a year earlier, compared to a recent peak of 9.5% in April.

Orphe Divounguy, a senior economist with Zillow, said he expects annual price growth in Southern California to slow further next year, but not turn negative.

Though more home owners are choosing to sell their home, many others still don’t want to give up their ultra-low mortgage rates they took out during the pandemic.

Divounguy said there’s also California’s long-running problem of building too few homes for all the people who want to live here. In some places that build more, prices are already falling compared to last year.

In the Austin metro area, prices were down 3.4% in November, according to Zillow.

“Until we see inventory catch up, like we have in some of these big metros that built a ton of housing, I don’t think we are going to see negative prices,” he said.

Locally, Zillow forecasts home prices in November 2025 to be 1.5% higher than they are today across Orange and Los Angeles counties. In the Inland Empire, values should climb 2.7%

Though prices may keep rising, if incomes climb as well and mortgage rates fall, the housing market could become more affordable to people looking to break in.

Depending on the time frame one looks at, that’s already happening to some extent.

Inflation and economic growth play a major role in the direction of mortgage rates. In May, mortgage rates were above 7%, but then steadily declined to 6.08% in September, amid signs inflation was easing and the economy was weakening.

Rates started climbing again, following stronger than expected job growth and fear among investors that an incoming Trump administration would institute policies such as sweeping tariffs and tax cuts that would reignite inflation.

In late November, mortgages rates hit 6.84%, but have declined somewhat since, clocking in at 6.6% as of Dec. 12, according to Freddie Mac.

In a statement announcing the latest mortgage rate figures, Freddie Mac chief economist Sam Khater noted that “while the outlook for the housing market is improving, the improvement is limited given that homebuyers continue to face stiff affordability headwinds.”

Explore home prices and rents for November

Use the tables below to search for home sale prices and apartment rental prices by city, neighborhood and county.

Rental prices in Southern California

In the last year, asking rents for apartments in many parts of Southern California have ticked down.

Experts say the trend is driven by a rising number of vacancies, which have forced some landlords to accept less in rent. Vacancies have risen because apartment supply is expanding and demand has fallen as consumers worry about the economy and inflation.

Additionally, the large millennial generation is increasingly aging into homeownership, as the smaller Generation Z enters the apartment market.

Prospective renters shouldn’t get too excited, however. Rent is still extremely high.

In November, the median rent for vacant units of all sizes across Los Angeles County was $2,057, down 1.2% from a year earlier but 7.2% more than in November 2019, according to data from Apartment List.