Broadbased Decline in Case-Shiller Home Price Indices
The October Case-Shiller numbers released last week for October 2011 were down from September in 19 of the 20 covered in the report. Only Phoenix showed an increase (up .3%). Tampa and Miami were down .5% and 1.2%, respectively. The 10 and 20 market national composite indices were down 1.1% and 1.2%.
Since last October of last year, every market is lower except Washington DC and Detroit. The DC market is up 1.3% since last October while Detroit is up 2.5%. I would say that the upswing in Detroit is because the only direction the index can move is up, however, it managed to drop 3.5% from September. If this trend continues, Detroit will be negative on the year. The current index for Detroit is now at 71.0 which means that today's home prices in Detroit are 29% lower than they were on January 1, 2000. After eleven years, home prices are down 29%.
The biggest and only double digit loser for the past year is Atlanta at down 11.7%. Atlanta shares the stage with Detroit in being the only two markets where prices are under January 1, 2000. Atlanta's index is 91, indicating that home prices have declined 9% over the past 11 years. The Tampa and Miami markets are down 6.1% and 4.0% since last October. The 10 and 20 market national composite indices are down 3.0% and 3.4% on the year.
The Standard and Poors Case Shiller indices measure the change in home prices across 20 markets. The indices are computed monthly with a 2 month lag (October indices are released in December). The indices are computed such that prices on January 1, 2000 equal 100. The percentage change between any two points in time can be measured by dividing change in the index by the index in the earlier period. For example, if the index for this month is 110 and the index for this month last year was 100, then home prices have increased 10%, at least as measured by the index. You can read more at Standard And Poors website.
