Let’s take a look at what happened in our market last year. Looking at the Santa Barbara Multiple Listing statistics from Santa Barbara Association of Realtors statistician Gary Woods, you will get a very clear picture of where we are today.

Year over year sales were down about 17 percent from 2013 for single-family homes/PUDs with the median sales price going up to about $1.12 million, about an 18.5 percent rise. Condominium sales were down only by about 1.6 percent and the median sales price rose to $560,000, about a 10 percent rise.

For both single-family homes and condos that sold in December, about 9 percent of those sales were over the asking price, 15 percent of the single-family homes had a price reduction and 18 percent of the condos dropped their prices as well.

For four years in a row, there has been a noticeable decline in listings. This tightening of inventory pushed prices up, however, and there was a cooling in this upward trend over the last five months of the year.

So, where do we go from here? Keep an eye on the interest rates. Should they begin to go up, the prices could soften, but if they remain low, then prices should remain fairly stable. The other factor of inventory controls the number of sales. Unless we see a loosening in the amount of homes coming onto the market, we will continue to see lowering sales volume and continued upward pressure on pricing.

There are still great opportunities for homebuyers to enter the market with incredibly low interest rates making monthly mortgage payments competitive with the price of renting. Contact your Realtor now for available listings and more market information.

— Reyne Stapelmann is a broker associate with Berkshire Hathaway Home Services, California Properties and the 2015 president of the Santa Barbara Association of Realtors. Contact her at reynestapelmann@cox.net or 805.705.4353. The opinions expressed are her own.