Single-Family Home Price Increases Continue to Deflate

Home price increases are continuing to trend down as housing demand falls amid rising mortgage rates. The annual rate of acceleration has slowed over the past seven months and is now at the lowest level since September 2020. Still, home prices continue to increase at a robust clip on a year-over-year basis. Home prices fell 0.6% from October to November, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index, which measures average home prices across the nation. That was the fifth straight month-over-month decline. On an annual basis, home prices were still up 7.7% in November, down from the 9.2% annual jump in October and well below the all-time highs of 20.8% in March and April. This pattern of deceleration was apparent at a regional level. The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller 20-City Composite Index posted a 6.8% annual gain in November, down from 8.6% the previous month. All 20 cities in the index reported price declines in November 2022 compared to October 2022. Some of the biggest month-to-month declines occurred in the West region of the country, with the steepest declines occurring in Las Vegas (-1.8%), San Francisco (-1.7%) and Phoenix (-1.6%). On an annual basis, all 20 cities recorded decelerating prices, with the smallest changes in the West region. San Francisco (-1.6%) was the first city to record a year-over-year decline in home prices, followed by very small gains in Seattle (1.5%), Portland (3.9%) and Los Angeles (4.4%). The Southeast region, on the other hand, posted some of the nation’s biggest hikes, led by Miami (18.4%), Tampa (16.9%) and Atlanta (12.7%).