Case-Shiller: Home prices grow at slower pace in Southern California
In another sign that the housing market is leveling off, home prices grew at a slower pace in March, according to a new report Tuesday.
The S&P/Case-Shiller Index rose 0.2% nationwide in the first quarter and is 10.3% ahead of this time last year. Case-Shiller’s closely watched 20-city composite index, which tracks prices in 20 major markets including Los Angeles and San Diego, is 12.4% above last year’s level.
While both rates remain positive, their growth has slowed down from last year, when prices surged -- especially in western markets -- amid a wave of investor-driven home buying.
“The year-over-year changes suggest that prices are rising more slowly,” said David Blitzer, chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices. “Annual price increases for the two composites have slowed in the last four months and 13 cities saw annual price changes moderate in March.”
Los Angeles was one of those cities. Prices here sit 16.8% above their level a year ago. That’s the slowest annual gain in 12 months. Prices here remain one-fifth below their peak in 2006, though they have recovered 36% since hitting bottom in 2009.
Still, March was the strongest month in the quarter, with the 20-city index climbing 0.9% from February after being flat the previous month, and were up 1.2% in metro Los Angeles. That could suggest the market was improving as it entered the spring selling season.
In a separate report also out Tuesday, the Federal Housing Finance Administration said its home price index showed prices nationwide climbed 1.3% in the first quarter, compared to the last three months of 2013. They were up 1.95% in metro Los Angeles, 2.5% in the Inland Empire and 2.9% in metro San Diego. All of those figures take seasonal variations into account.
More recent figures from April suggest price growth continued to slow in Southern California, but that sales and inventory are improving, which economists say could point to the beginnings of a more sustainable -- if slower -- recovery in the housing market after years of boom-and-bust patterns.
