O'ahu single-family home prices, which began to cool last year, will likely remain in the $600,000 to $650,000 range for several years, according to one real estate expert.

"We'd like to say that the market is stabilizing or normalizing," said Harvey Shapiro, research economist with the Honolulu Board of Realtors.

"It's not overheated like it was."

The Honolulu Board of Relators yesterday released its quarterly housing market statistics for fourth quarter 2006, which provided further evidence that the housing prices are leveling.

According to the board, the median sales price for single-family homes during the last three months of 2006 was $620,000, down from $635,000 in the third quarter and unchanged from the fourth quarter a year earlier.

Median price means half the prices were above and half below the given price.

The number of single-family home sales slipped 15 percent in the fourth quarter to 935 from 1,093 sales during the same three-month period a year earlier.

The median sales price for a single-family condo was $315,000 in the fourth quarter, unchanged from the third quarter and up from $300,000 during the fourth quarter of 2005.

The number of condo sales fell to 1,034 during the fourth quarter, down from 1,783 sales in the same quarter a year earlier.

The total dollar value of all home sales slipped 17.3 percent to about $1.21 billion in the latest fourth quarter from $1.64 billion in the year-earlier period.

Shapiro said he expects prices to remain stable during the next years if current economic conditions persist.

After the long run up in prices, it will take some time for personal incomes to catch up, he said.

"If history repeats itself, the next upswing should be in three or four years," he said.

Reach Rick Daysog at rdaysog@honoluluadvertiser.com.