January Housing Report
For the eighth straight month, the Case-Shiller Housing Index rose a seasonally-adjusted 0.3% in January 2010—slightly better than expected. The index is published every month by Standard and Poors and reports on housing prices, using data from across the United States. This month’s report is for the three months ending January 2010, which rose compared to the three months ending in December, 2009.
Price gains were mostly in the California markets of Los Angeles and San Diego, which have seen first-time home buyers and real estate investors competing on foreclosures.
Some analysts saw the news as a mix of good and bad, as a softening of prices indicates declines ahead. The fall of 2009 saw sales numbers rising, when the Federal first time buyers $8000 tax credit was scheduled to end in November. The extension of the deadline to April 30 didn’t appear to help, as momentum was lost and sales dropped. Experts predict the Case-Shiller Index will fall in the next few months.
For January, though, Los Angeles home prices were saw the biggest gains, up 1.7% while at the other end of the seesaw, Chicago home prices dropped 0.8%. For the decade of January 2000 – January 2010, the three top cities are Los Angeles, New York and Washington, DC, where home prices rose over 70% on average. The worst city for home prices in the decade was Detroit, at 28% lower in January 2010 than in January 2000.
Not all indices are equal, however. While Case-Shiller’s data shows a slight increase in home prices, two others indicate drops in January. The First American CoreLogic Home Price Index, was down 1.9% and the Federal Housing Finance Agency dropped 0.6% in January and 2% in December.
The end of the first time home buyer’s tax credit could open up the market for real estate investors, since a big chunk of buyers will likely remove themselves from the market.