IE home prices are softening, but buyers haven't pulled back

Citrus Belt Review: National coverage of the spring market flattens the IE into one line: prices down, buyers spooked. The local read is more interesting, because the two halves of the market are moving in opposite directions. In the city of Riverside, the median sale price over the three months ending April was $630,000 — down 2.3% from a year earlier. But 484 homes sold in April, up from 440 the year before. Price down, volume up, in the same market at the same time.

Widen to the counties and the pattern holds. Riverside County's median was essentially flat year over year at $615,000 in March, with sales up to 2,354 from 2,294. San Bernardino County's median slipped about 2.7% to $535,000, but sales held roughly even — 1,439 against 1,455. Across all three, the price line points down while the volume line stays flat or climbs. A market actually losing buyers doesn't look like that; it loses transactions first.

Part of the price dip isn't a price dip at all. When more modestly priced homes make up a larger share of what sells, the median falls even if no individual home lost value — a mix-shift, not a markdown. That distinction is the one national coverage skips, and it matters for anyone reading the median as a signal about their own equity. Days on market back up the steadier read: Riverside homes still go pending in about 42 days, unchanged from last year.

The forward indicator points the same way. NAR's pending-home-sales index, which tracks signed contracts before they close, rose 1.4% in April and 3.2% year over year, with the West holding steady to higher. Chief economist Lawrence Yun put it as buyers moving with "cautious optimism" despite a slight rise in mortgage rates. None of this says the IE is heating up — forecasters split on the back half of 2026, and some expect another soft spring. But the data in hand describes a market finding its level, not falling off one.