North County Times: "Home prices pull back"

Home prices in Riverside County slipped 2 percent last month, supporting a growing consensus that the housing market is coming back to reality.

Real-estate professionals warned Tuesday not to make too much of the small dip from a record $393,000 in June. Changes from year to year are more important, they said.

But even when compared to last summer, the signs of a slowdown were clear, according to builders and real-estate agents. Prices rose 18 percent from July 2004, about half as fast as the year-over-year increases recorded late last year.

The slowdown comes as prices for single-family homes soar out of the reach of more and more single families. Riverside County's affordability index, a number used by the California Association of Realtors, fell to 14 in June from 18 in May, the group said Thursday.

"It's priced way too many people out of the market," Jim Hamilton, the association's president, said in an interview.

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