The Grand Strand's hot resale real estate market is continuing its Energizer Bunny-like run: Condominiums and single family homes are selling faster; more are being sold than ever before and for the highest average price ever. The Myrtle Beach, SC real estate market is booming!

In fact, the average home sales price has topped $200,000 along the Grand Strand for the first time. And while that average is partly a reflection of the growing drive to build more expensive homes and a doubling of the above $300,000 market, it is more evidence of a years-long trend that has been putting a strain on the area's affordable housing supply.

The average has risen about 31 percent since 1999.

"It shows a very healthy market," said Tom Maeser, president of Fortune Academy of Real Estate. "The only area of potential concern for buyers is when average price keeps going up. We're bringing in a lot more higher-end buyers than we used to. It doesn't take many million-dollar homes to raise the price."

Maeser said the addition of million-dollar homes such as those in the Grande Dunes area have driven up the average price.

Rachel Broadhurst of Century 21 Broadhurst in Myrtle Beach said those million-dollar homes have skewed the numbers and plenty of affordable housing is available.

"There's still a tremendous variety of product and price range," she said.

But that supply is being squeezed.

While the average price rose 11 percent to $210,466 through September compared with the same period last year, the median price rose almost as fast. Half of all homes sold through the third quarter this year cost at least $158,000, a 10.5 percent jump, according to figures from Fortune Academy and Coastal Carolinas Association of Realtors. Those figures capture about 80 percent of single-family homes and condominiums - mostly resales but new home sales, as well - in Horry and Georgetown counties, as well as some in Brunswick County, N.C.

And although the supply of the most expensive homes continues to climb, the overall supply of homes has decreased.

"We're very short on inventory," said Chuck Houseman of The Litchfield Co. Real Estate.

Broadhurst said the market is still stable despite the reduction in inventory.

It's not a seller's market, she said.

There were 5 percent fewer resale single-family homes and 19 percent fewer resale condos listed on the multiple listing service this year through the third quarter compared with the same period last year.

There’s still availability:

Phil Cox, Broker-in-Charge of Resort Vacation Services at the popular Myrtle Beach Resort chimed in, “ sales prices are climbing almost daily as the availability of resale units declines. Our company continues to acquire listings to satisfy the demand but it’s hard to say what might happen come spring which is typically ‘buying season’. If I were considering a vacation condo, I’d be picking it up this winter. Experts anticipate that ocean view property will never be cheaper.” Click here to see sample prices.

The usual suspects are driving the market:

Historically low interest rates and an increasing number of mortgage products that make home ownership a possibility for a larger pool of potential buyers. Rates are forecasted to rise, with the 30-year fixed climbing to about 6.5 percent, by the fourth quarter of next year, about 1 percent higher than today's rates but still low by historical standards.

The struggles of the stock market make real estate look like an even more attractive investment. The Dow Jones industrials recently dropped below 10,000 points again, despite solid earnings reports from several companies, because of the uncertainty with the upcoming elections, the war in Iraq and only modest monthly national job growth.

The job market here and elsewhere has stabilized, even if it hasn't taken off. While South Carolina's jobless rate is

6.9 percent compared with the nation's 5.4 percent, Horry County had a 4.1 percent rate in September, fourth-lowest of the state's 46 counties. The county's labor force is more than 8,000 workers larger this year than last year.

Even Georgetown County's 11.8 percent rate is a drop from the 14 percent rate reached earlier this year, and roughly the same amount of people in Georgetown were working this September compared with last September.

Oceanfront building and sales are driving the sales growth, as well, particularly as retirees and those seeking second homes continue flocking to the resort lifestyle of the Grand Strand.

All that has translated into a 49 percent jump in existing condo sales this year, a 24 percent increase in existing single-family homes and 13 fewer days on average to sell an existing single-family home this year compared with last year's 170 days.

The local increase in home sales is outpacing the fast 17 percent growth rate of the S.C. housing market.

"People are really, really buying right now," said Phil Stalvey, executive vice president of the banking group of Coastal Federal Bank. "It's really hot."