Nationwide home prices continued to recover in January, but how did our local housing market perform by comparison?

Chicago home prices continued to lag behind most of the nation’s major housing markets in January according to the lastest Case-Shiller Home Price Indices from Standard & Poor’s, though the situation was not entirely bad for the Windy City.

For January, Chicago home prices were down 0.9 percent from December; though that’s the fifth straight month of declines for Chicago, home price declines are expected this time of the year, a historically slow period for home prices (for instance, the city with the largest monthly increase, Las Vegas, saw prices rise just 1.6 percent).

Year-over-year home prices in Chicago were up 3.3 percent, though the city’s yearly gains were among the weakest in the nation, with only New York posting weaker yearly returns – though to be fair, that increase did come after 28 consecutive months of negative annual returns for the Big Apple, so even things at the bottom are looking up in housing.

Nationwide Home Prices Continue to Recover in Case-Shiller

Nationwide, home prices continued to show notable improvement:

• Year-over-year, home prices were up 7.3 percent in the Case-Shiller’s 10-City Composite and 8.1 percent in its 20-City Composite, with all 20 cities measured by S&P showing yearly price increases; those are the highest yearly increases for the composites since the summer of 2006.
• Even monthly, the 10- and 20-City Composites were positive, with prices rising 0.2 and 0.1 percent, respectively.
• On a monthly basis, nine cities – Atlanta, Charlotte, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Phoenix, San Francisco and Tampa – showed positive returns, while yearly, eight cities – Atlanta, Detroit, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis, Phoenix and San Francisco – saw prices jump by double digits.

David M. Blitzer – Data Supports the Housing Recovery

David M. Blitzer, the chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices, said the latest Case-Shiller data supports the now widely held notion of a broad housing recovery.

“The two headline composites posted their highest year-over-year increases since summer 2006. This marks the highest increase
since the housing bubble burst,” Blitzer said. “Economic data continues to support the housing recovery. Single-family homebuilding permits and housing
starts posted double-digit year-over-year increases in February 2013. Despite a slight uptick in foreclosure filings, numbers are still down 25 percent year-over-year. Steady employment and low borrowing rates pushed inventories down to their lowest post-recession levels.”