House prices in the Twin Cities and across the country are rising, though not as quickly as last year, according to the latest S&P/Case-Shiller House Price Indices, which show prices in the Twin Cities rising 1.3 percent from April and 8.4 percent compared with last year. A 20-city composite including the largest metros in the nation was up 1.1 percent from May and 9.3 percent from last year.
While the month-to-month increase in the Twin Cities was one of the biggest gains since last year, the more moderate annual gain nationwide was below expectations.
"Housing has been turning in mixed economic numbers in the last few months," said David Blitzer, Chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices. "Prices and sales of existing homes have shown improvement while construction and sales of new homes continue to lag. At the same time, the broader economy and especially employment are showing larger improvements and substantial gains."
Here are a few highlights from the report:
- For the second consecutive month, all 20 regions posted increases with Charlotte posted its highest monthly increase of 1.4 percent in more than a year.
- Year-over-year, nine cities – Las Vegas (16.9%), San Francisco (15.4%), Miami (13.2%), San Diego (12.4%), Los Angeles (12.3%), Detroit (11.9%), Atlanta (11.2%), Tampa (10.2%) and Portland (10.0%) – posted double-digit increases in May 2014. The Sun Belt continues to lead with seven of the top eight performing cities.
- Eighteen of the 20 cities in the composite had lower year-over-year numbers than last month.
- All of the 20 cities reported month-over-month increases with nine cities, including Charlotte, Cleveland, Detroit, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis, New York and Tampa, showing larger increases in May than in April.
