April Resales of O.C. Homes Post 1st Gain in 25 Months : Real estate: The 17.6% increase from the same month in 1990 is attributed to lower selling prices and interest rates.

After more than two years of bad news, Orange County’s realtors got something to cheer about Tuesday: Completed sales of single-family resale homes in April posted the first year-over-year gain in 25 months.

And in addition to the 17.6% hike from April, 1990, closed escrows last month were up 27.2% from March, 1991, according to the California Assn. of Realtors’ monthly survey.

It was the second consecutive monthly gain in Orange County, following March’s 53.3% increase from February.

The jump in resales not only spells relief for the county’s financially beleaguered real estate agents and brokers, it signals the start of an upward trend in new-tract sales as shoppers flush with proceeds from their recent home sales begin touring models in new-home developments.

The realtors association’s chief economist cautioned against too much euphoria over the sales trend, however.

“April’s sales activity was stronger than expected and was intensified by the temporary boost in pent-up housing demand created by the Gulf War,” said Leslie Appleton-Young, vice president of research and economics for the Los Angeles-based trade group. “However, given the uncertainty over the national economy, housing sales may level off to a more sustainable level in coming months,” she said.

Dan Slater, an agent with Orange Realty Associates in Orange, said his experiences over the past several months uphold Appleton-Young’s analysis.

March and April traditionally are the best months of the year, Slater said, adding immediately after the ground war in the Persian Gulf started in February and people saw that things were going smoothly for U.S. troops “there was a big sigh of relief among home buyers and people started buying and that’s the boost we’ve seen through early April.”

But in May, Slater said, “sales seem to be slacking off again, and I expect the rest of the year will be pretty lackluster. It will be better than last year, but nothing like the boom in the late ‘80s,” he said.

Tom Williams, president of the Southern California division of Coldwell Banker Residential, agreed. His division’s 18 Orange County offices posted a sizable increase in sales in the first quarter of 1991 over the first three months of 1990. April, too, was a good month, he said. “But it would surprise me to see many more year-over-year increases like April’s.”

Key factors in the sales increase in Orange County and in other coastal metropolitan areas of the state, realtors said, were lower selling prices and interest rates.

The median price of a resale single-family home in Orange County was $240,480 in April, down 1.8% from $244,784 a year earlier but up 0.8% from $238,600 in March, 1991.

“Sellers are being more realistic in the pricing of their properties, and that combined with other things like (lower) interest rates and more consumer confidence means we have been seeing more sales,” said Esther Goff, president of the Saddleback Valley Board of Realtors and an agent with Prudential California Realty in Mission Viejo.

“It’s certainly not a buying frenzy like in 1988, but at least the market is stabilizing.”

Resale Home Prices and Sales Here are figures compiled by local member boards of the California Assn. of Realtors on the median price and sales volume of existing single-family homes in Orange County. Median Price In thousands of dollars Jan-April, ‘91: $240,480 Sales Monthly percentage change Jan-April, ‘91: +27.2