A month after boasting the strongest home price growth in the nation, the Chicagoland housing market continued its strong pace in the most recent Case-Shiller Home Price Indices, which covered home prices through June.
Per S&P’s computations, home prices in Chicagoland rose 1.1 percent from May to June and 3.3 percent from June 2015. Although the market’s yearly price growth was among the weakest in the nation, its monthly growth was among the strongest, with only four metro areas nationwide seeing better increases.
The June Case-Shiller
Nationally, home prices were consistent from the previous report:
- The National Home Price Index, which covers all nine U.S. census divisions, rose 5.1 percent year-over-year in June, which was unchanged from May.
- Meanwhile, the 10- and 20-City Composites rose 4.3 and 5.1 percent, respectively; those increases were down from 4.4 and 5.3 percent in May.
- On a monthly basis, the National Index rose 1.0 percent, while both the 10-City Composite and the 20-City Composite posted 0.8 percent increases.
- Those numbers, though, were before seasonal adjustments – after making such alterations, the National Index only rose 0.2 percent, while the composites both fell 0.1 percent.
“Overall … housing is in good shape”
David M. Blitzer, the managing director and chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices, spoke positively about the housing market in his comments, which accompanied the Case-Shiller report.
“Overall, residential real estate and housing is in good shape,” Blitzer said. “Sales of existing homes are at running at about 5.5 million units annually with inventory levels under five months, indicating a fairly tight market. Sales of new single family homes were at a 654,000 seasonally adjusted annual rate in July, the highest rate since Nov. 2007. Housing starts in July topped an annual rate of 1.2 million units.”
Blitzer did mention, though, that not every area of the economy is doing well.
“While the real estate sector and consumer spending are contributing to economic growth, business capital spending continues to show weakness,” he said.