Dwelling Costs Hit Document Excessive Once more in April, S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Index Exhibits
Home prices rose to a record high in April for the second month in a row, according to the closely watched S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Home Price Indices.
An index tracking home prices at the national level rose an unadjusted 6.3% from the year prior, while an index tracking price growth in 20 large U.S. metropolitan areas rose 7.2%. Consensus estimates had called for a 6.9% gain in the 20-city index.
It was the second month in a row that the national index notched a record, and the third for the 20-city index. “Heading into summer, the market is at an all-time high, once again testing its resilience,” Brian D. Luke, S&P Dow Jones Indices’s head of commodities, real and digital assets, wrote in a statement.
The data is an industry standard for measuring home price changes, but lags behind less comprehensive measures that are published more frequently. National Association of Realtors data show that the median existing home sold for $419,300 in May, a record, as year-over-year price growth accelerated.
Prices in all 20 cities measured by Case-Shiller were higher than year-ago levels. The strongest increase was 10.3% in San Diego and the weakest gain was 1.7% in Portland, Ore.
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Prices in 13 of the 20 cities in the index reached new highs. The record-setters were spread across the map, including Los Angeles; Washington, D.C.; Miami; Boston; Detroit; and Minneapolis, among others. Of the seven cities that trailed behind their previous all-time highs, prices in Phoenix, Seattle, and San Francisco were most off the mark, with prices roughly 5% to 8% away from their prior highs.
Home prices and mortgage rates, the two big factors that determine home affordability, both have made this spring a difficult one for would-be buyers. Existing-home sales in May fell to their lowest seasonally adjusted annual rate since January, reflecting a relative shortage of homes for sale and the rise in mortgage rates above 7% this spring.
Still, there is some good news for prospective buyers: More homes for sale are hitting the market. It would take 3.7 months to sell through every previously owned home listed for sale at the end of May, the National Association of Realtors said earlier this month. That is still quicker than its long-term average, but represents the largest supply relative to sales since mid-2020.
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More homes hitting the market means prospective buyers will have more options, and that prices are likely to rise less quickly. The Mortgage Bankers Association expects prices measured by the FHFA US House Price Index to be 4.5% higher than one year prior in the fourth quarter. That compares with the gain of 6.6% recorded in the first quarter.
Write to Shaina Mishkin at shaina.mishkin@dowjones.com
