Tag: autumn

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The 2010 Residential Wrap-Up: What’s goin’ on? Not much.

Avid readers of this blog will recall that I hastily pulled my last attempt to post on this subject because of some errors in the data.  Horrors.  The errors caused 2010 to look like a much stronger year in terms of price increases for single family homes.

Whether that would have been good news or bad depends, of course, on whether you’re trying to buy or sell.  As it is, 2010 ended up being a wash from either perspective.  Here’s the chart (click to enlarge:

Continue reading “The 2010 Residential Wrap-Up: What’s goin’ on? Not much.”

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Case-Shiller Sounds a Cautiously Positive Note

Last week, Case-Shiller released January data for its closely watched national housing index.  Nationally, things are looking up – well, make that flat.  And that’s good news. In the wonderfully backward language of the report, the index’s year over year rate of decline “improved.”  Basically, we are back to where housing values were a year ago.

Since for most of us our homes represent our biggest asset, that’s pretty good news when you consider how bleak things looked back in March of 2009.  Just think of how you were feeling about your 401(k)s.

But before you break out the champagne, consider that national home prices have now “recovered” to levels last seen in Autumn 2003.  That’s over six years of appreciation wiped out.

The San Francisco Metropolitan Statistical Area (that’s 5 of the 9 Bay Area Counties, folks) is up 15.2% from its trough value. Case-Shiller does not break out San Francisco proper from the much larger MSA.  However, I calculate that median prices in January were up just 10% from the lows reached in March 2009.  (I use 3 month moving averages, which approximates the seasonal adjustments the CS Index uses.)  To see how SF did through 2009, check out my blog and charts here.