Tag Archives: Home Values

The housing market in California's Southland region closed out 2012 with the highest number of December home sales in three years, real estate information company DataQuick reports. According to DataQuick, a total of 20,274 new and resale homes and condos were sold in Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino, and Orange counties in December. The month's total was 5.1 percent up from November and 5.3 percent up from December 2011.

Economic activity "expanded" in the closing weeks of 2012, the Federal Reserve said in its periodic Beige Book released Wednesday, reflecting a slow but steadily declining unemployment rate and low rates of inflation--conditions the Fed said would have to be met before it raises interest rates. According to the report, "real estate activity has expanded or held steady in 11 Districts for existing home sales and leasing; eight Districts for residential construction; 11 Districts for nonresidential sales and leasing; and nine Districts for nonresidential construction."

Rising demand and limited supply continued to drive home prices up in November, according to the latest Residential Price Index (RPI) data from FNC, Inc.

According to commentary from Daniel Dektar, chief investment officer at Smith Breeden Associates, all the fundamentals are in place for a housing upturn - if pent-up demand can actually translate into buyer interest.

After measuring improvements over the two years, Trulia ranked Las Vegas as the top turnaround market in 2012 based on its recovery in asking prices. Trulia also found nine out of the top 10 turnaround markets were located West and Southwest, and the top six saw double digit increases. In 2011, only 12 out of 100 metros saw price increases compared to 82 in 2012. In addition, none of the 100 largest metros saw price declines greater than 10 percent in 2012 compared to 6 in 2011.

The national housing market has hit bottom and is now in full recovery mode, according to Veros Real Estate Solutions, a provider of risk management and valuation services. While there remains--as always--some variance across markets, Veros predicts prices in two-thirds of all markets across the nation will either remain flat or rise over the next 12 months. This is the first time since the recession that Veros has forecast gains (or at least no declines) for such a large proportion of markets.

A survey of economists conducted by Pulsenomics and published by Zillow shows high hopes for home prices in 2013 and beyond.

New home sales jumped 4.4 percent in November to 377,000, the highest level since April 2010, the Census Bureau and HUD.

Home prices fell in October for the first time since March according to the monthly Case Shiller Home Price Index.

After five years of cumulative losses, home values will finally post their first annual gain, according to data from Zillow. The calculations show homes are expected to gain $1.3 trillion in cumulative value for 2012, the largest gain since 2005 and the first annual increase since 2006, Zillow reported. The company expects the year-end total to reach $23.7 trillion, which is a 6 percent increase from last year's total. In 2011, the cumulative loss in home values was $792 billion compared to 2010.