Source: usatoday.com

The Monterey area is more urbanized and varied now than when John Steinbeck wrote Cannery Row in 1945, and that's reflected in the varying real estate market. The customary farming region of Salinas has detonated with new progress, not only to keep up with the growing population but as well to house middle-class families who can no longer pay for the still-rising home costs in the coastal towns.

Home sales in Monterey are moribund, though, as they are all over California. Many of the new homes in Salinas are sitting vacant, and lenders through foreclosure are seizing more houses, says Leslie Appleton-the Young, chief economist for the California Association of Realtors.

Do not be fooled, she says, by the 12% raise in the median home cost in April. In a number of areas, costs are falling, but the median price — half the houses price more, half price less — are rising for the reason that of strength in the top end of the marketplace. Wealthy buyers, who are unaffected by interest rates, gas costs or rising belongings taxes, are ongoing to purchase second and retirement houses in tony areas like Carmel and Pebble Beach.