NORTH COUNTY - Home prices in North County continued to slump in December as a credit crunch took a serious bite out of the upper end of the housing market, according to a new report by the North San Diego County Association of Realtors.

The median price of detached homes was $569,000, down 9 percent from the same month a year ago, and 3.4 percent less than November's price.

Even steeper was the fall in the median price of condos and detached homes combined: an 8 percent dive in one month, to $485,000.

A likely reason for the sharp decline in the aggregate median was that sales were relatively stronger for low-priced homes and weaker at the upper end of the market, said Robert Brown, who compiled the report and is an economics professor at Cal State San Marcos.

"It didn't surprise me at all," Brown said. "It's a trend that we've really been seeing for several months. It's sort of surprising it hasn't happened sooner, with sales down for a while now."

The median represents the middle point of prices, with half of the homes selling for more and half selling for less.

Year-over-year sales numbers for local homes priced more than $1 million fell 39 percent to 88, according to the report, known as HomeDex.

Upper-end home sales were higher in November than the previous year, and the numbers had remained strong through much of the year while the rest of the market struggled.

Market participants said that one reason fewer expensive homes sold is that mortgage defaults have led banks to tighten their lending standards, especially on "jumbo" loans - those for values over $417,000 - that are increasingly difficult to obtain.

A loan under $417,000 that fits certain criteria is eligible for purchase by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, corporations chartered by the government. That backing encourages lenders to make those loans.

"I'm seeing just about the same (number of applications). The problem is we can do a lot fewer of them," said Dave Hopkins, a senior loan officer with Rancho Financial Mortgage, a brokerage firm based in Rancho Bernardo. "The programs are just not available any longer."

Jumbo loan financing has also become more expensive. Interest rates on jumbo loans historically were less than 0.25 percentage points higher than the loans for smaller amounts.

Since September, they have cost almost a full percentage point more, according to federal government reports.

And buyers remain scarce. Total sales of detached homes in December were down precipitously in North County, dropping 34 percent from last year and 1.1 percent from November, the HomeDex report said.

The $569,000 median price last month for single-family, detached homes was the region's lowest median since November 2004.

North County's median price hit an all-time peak of $667,000 in June 2007 and has fallen 14.7 percent since.

While the median price fell 3.4 percent from November to December, the median price per square foot in North County declined 6.1 percent to $263, or 14.6 percent less than in November.

That could mean buyers were getting more house for their money or that larger, more expensive homes were not selling.

"I believe that the price drop is even greater than the median prices are showing," said Dennis Smith, a Carlsbad-based real estate agent. "If your house is 3 percent larger and you're getting a 3 percent drop in price, it's a 6 percent drop in real prices."

The average home price, the sum of all home prices divided by the number of sales, showed a steeper decline in price values.

For all of San Diego County, the average sale price tumbled 9.5 percent from November to December while the median showed a 6.1 percent drop during that time.

For North County, the average fell by 5 percent month to month, compared with the 3.4 percent downturn in the median.

Price declines have led some real estate agents to encourage consumers to buy.

"(Prices) may fall a little bit more, but I think we're awfully close to the bottom," said Jerry Kalman, a Realtor in the Fallbrook area. "We'll bump along the bottom for a while, but I don't think we'll see the decline we saw this year."

Not all Realtors agree with Kalman's forecast. Smith said he thinks the county could be as much as 18 months away from seeing prices hit their lowest point.

But he still thinks consumers should buy a home as long as they plan to stay for a long period.

"This is the best time to buy within the last three years because prices are down from where they were three years ago," Smith said. "Is there still room for them to go down more? Definitely."

- Contact staff writer Zach Fox at (760) 740-5412 or zfox@nctimes.com.