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WASHINGTON: US single family home prices fell for the seventh straight month in January, bringing prices to just above April 2009 lows, a closely watched survey said on Tuesday, Mar 29.
The S&P/Case-Shiller composite index of 20 metropolitan areas declined 0.2% in January from December on a seasonally adjusted basis where a Reuters poll of economists forecast a drop of 0.4%. Prices in the 20 cities have fallen 3.1% year-over-year against the expected 3.2%.
"The housing market recession is not yet over," said David Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at S&P. "At most, we have seen all statistics bounce along their troughs; at worst, the feared double-dip recession may be materialising."
Eleven of the 20 cities fell to the lowest levels since home prices peaked in 2006 and 2007, while the overall index was just 1.1% above the April 2009 low, the report showed.
Unadjusted for seasonal impact, home prices fell 1% for the month. Only San Diego and Washington, DC showed annual price increases.
The Case-Shiller index lags data from the National Association of Realtors, which reported earlier this month US that the median US home price had hit a nine-year low in February as home sales volumes plunged 9.6%.
In a separate report, the realtors group on Monday said contracts for sales of previously owned US homes rose 2.1% in February after two straight declines.
The pending contracts data leads existing home sales by a month or two and suggests some of the recent weakness was due to unusually severe winter weather. — Reuters
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