Home prices continued to rise in July, one reason the housing market may be slowing slightly, as would-be home buyers wait until prices cool a bit. San Francisco accumulated the biggest gain of 10.4% in these 20 cities. And on Monday, the National Assn. of Realtors reported that pending sales – based off signed contracts, not closed deals – fell 1.4% last month.
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The price index has risen at a 4 percent or higher annual rate since September 2012, well ahead of inflation, Blitzer said.
Yesterday, Black Knight Financial Services released its HPI report showing that home prices increased 0.4% in July compared with June and increased 5.3% compared with July 2014.
Nationwide prices are still about 5 percent behind where they were before the economic downturn.
After seasonal adjustment the national index was up 0.4 per cent. The 10-city and 20-city composite were both down 0.2 per cent over the month. Prices are rising at more than double the rate of wages, which have increased just 2.2 percent in the past 12 months.
In 2013 and the first half of 2014, local prices increased at annual rates of between 10 percent and 20 percent.
“The recent trend in Case-Shiller prices has been flat-to-down, but we very much doubt this accurately reflects what’s really happening in the existing homes market, where sales have jumped sharply this year”, said Ian Shepherdson of Pantheon Macroeconomics.
“The two smallest gains since January 2000 are Detroit at three percent and Cleveland at 10 percent”, Blitzer says. The Sunbelt cities-Miami, Tampa, Phoenix and Las Vegas-which were the poster children of the housing boom, have yet to make new all-time highs. The data is after taking into account the seasonal fluctuations.
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The increase in the S&P/Case-Shiller index of property values followed a 4.9 percent advance in June, the group said Tuesday in New York. That factor is likely keeping many prospective buyers away from the market. To learn more about our company, please visit www.spdji.com. These trademarks have been licensed to S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC. The EconoTimes content received through this service is the intellectual property of EconoTimes or its third party suppliers.
