Home prices are up 5.7 percent, according to Corelogic's Home Price Index Report released Tuesday. On a year-to-year basis home prices, including distressed sales, increased in January 2015. Excluding distressed sales home prices increased 5.6 percent year-over-year in January. On a month-to-month basis, home prices increased 1.1 percent from December 2014. Excluding distressed sales home prices were up 1.4 percent month-over-month in January.
Home prices reached their peak in April 2006. Regionally, few states have yet to bounce from back to their peak. However, many states in the Midwest register numbers close to or matching their 2006 peak, with Texas, Colorado, and Wyoming showing a zero percent change. The West has the highest levels in price depreciation with California, Nevada, Arizona and Idaho showing the largest drop from their peak levels. The Northeast and South also show mostly drops in home prices compared to the 2006 peak with one state, New York, showing now change. All of these comparisons include distressed home sales.
Educated 20-somethings and the wealthy are flocking to cities, creating a new model for what an American city typically looks like, according to a report released by the University of Virginia’s Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service. In the 1990s, U.S. cities were made up of a ring of thriving suburbs surrounding a decaying center. This “donut” model had wealthy and educated residents in the outer ring, while the center was filled with poor, minority-dominated residents. Today, cities resemble a new donut pattern with a resurgence of downtown and historic centers, often driven by young adults.