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Home prices gain again in February

Buyers, Realtors and brokers look over a 1920s California Bungalow for sale in Highland Park.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
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Home prices in the nation’s largest American cities continued their strong gains in February, new data show.

The Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller home price index of 20 American cities rose 0.3% over the prior month and was up 9.3% over February 2012. All of the cities covered by the index have risen year-over-year for two consecutive months.

“Home prices continue to show solid increases across all 20 cities,” said David M. Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at S&P; Dow Jones Indices. “Despite some recent mixed economic reports for March, housing continues to be one of the brighter spots in the economy.”

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Phoenix, San Francisco, Las Vegas and Atlanta were the four cities with the highest year-over-year price increases. With heavy investor interest, Atlanta appears now to have recovered from a wave of foreclosures in 2012, while the Western cities have shown particular strength after crashing hard during the bust. New York, Boston and Chicago saw the smallest year-over-year gains last month.

Phoenix posted particularly strong gains, up 23% over the year. That metro region has emerged as the epicenter of the recovery.

California metro areas also gained over the year. The San Diego area was up 10.2%, San Francisco 18.9% and Los Angeles 14.1%.

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