The number of homes selling in Tooele County has fallen dramatically over the first three quarters of 2007, but home prices continue to trend upward over the same period, according to data from the Wasatch Front Regional Multiple Listing Service.

Tooele County had the largest decline in sales volume of the five counties -- the others were Salt Lake, Davis, Utah and Weber -- for which data was compiled. Tooele County home sales dropped 36.4 percent compared to the previous year.

At the same time, median home sales prices in the county are still rising -- up 13.4 percent to $189,950 in Tooele, and up 19 percent to $217,900 in Grantsville. In fact, those two cities rate of appreciation outpaces the other four counties.

Tooele's Re/Max Platinum Broker/Owner Dan Egelund said the trend of declining volume and rising prices just means the market is stabilizing after last year's boom.

"The market is still good and healthy right now, even though you wouldn't think so compared to last year," he said. "For home sales, last year was extremely hot, but this year it's just been healthy. Prices have stabilized right now, and I think we'll continue to see a downward stabilization [in sales volume] of 5 percent over the next four months."

Egelund also pointed out that the higher the home price goes up in a certain area, the lower the sales volume will become.

"Lower prices attract more buyers, and if we were still selling homes for $169,938 like we were back in July of 2006, I'm sure we would go back up to the number of homes sold that we had back then," he said. "However, we've got wide-open spaces here, and it's still a wonderful time to be buying. A family can come out here and get a home for $73,000 less than a home in Salt Lake County."

Vicki Griffith of Prudential Real Estate said that with Tooele County's reputation as a reasonably priced bedroom community for Salt Lake City, she anticipates growth in the area to stay steady into the future.

"There's still affordable housing here in Tooele County for young families just starting out, and we expect to grow much over the next 10 years," she said. "We still have buyers out here, but now instead of taking six to seven days to sell a house it takes more like 60 to 90 days. We're going back to the way things were before the big boom of last year."

Doug Radunich: dougrad@tooeletranscript.com