Analyst Says Decline in Home Prices May Have Come to an End
However, March’s annual gain was the slowest since summer 2012.
Some analysts see a potential end to sagging housing prices – at least for now – after March showed back-to-back monthly increases.
“The modest increases in home prices we saw a month ago accelerated in March 2023,” said Craig J. Lazzara, managing director at S&P DJI, in prepared remarks.
Home prices nationally in March were 0.7% higher than in March 2022, S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Indices said.
After seasonal adjustment, prices increased nationally by 0.4% in March compared with February. The 10-city composite gained 0.6% and the 20-city composite rose 0.5%.
“Two months of increasing prices do not a definitive recovery make, but March’s results suggest that the decline in home prices that began in June 2022 may have come to an end,” Lazzara said.
March marked the 11th straight month of decelerating annual home price gains and March’s annual gain was the slowest since the summer of 2012.
Meanwhile, the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s House Price Index reported that nationally, the U.S. housing market has experienced positive annual appreciation each quarter since the start of 2012.
As for year-over-year for Q1, it showed home prices rising by 4.3 percent and 0.5 percent compared to Q4 2022.
“U.S. house prices generally increased modestly in the first quarter” Dr. Anju Vajja, Principal Associate Director in FHFA’s Division of Research and Statistics, said in prepared remarks.
“However, year over year prices in many western states have started to decline for the first time in over ten years.”
The five areas with the highest annual appreciation year over year for Q1 were South Carolina, 9.5 percent; North Carolina, 9.4 percent; Maine, 8.9 percent; Vermont, 8.8 percent; and 5) Arkansas, 8.8 percent.
Areas showing the highest annual depreciation were Utah, -4.3 percent; Nevada, -3.6 percent; California, -2.9 percent; Washington, -2.6 percent; and the District of Columbia, -2.3 percent.