Home prices fall 7.7% in past year, according to Case-Shiller Index

Posted Jan 29th 2008 1:33PM by Joseph Lazzaro
Filed under: Bad News, Economic Data, Housing, Recession

Home price depreciation accelerated in November, with prices falling in all 20 cities surveyed by the Case-Shiller Home Price Index, survey officials announced [pdf] Tuesday.

Prices fell a record 2.2% in November 2007, and 7.7% in the past year. Just as ominous, home prices fell in all 20 cities in November 2007, and prices in the last three months fell at a 16.2% annual rate. In addition, the survey's original 10-city index fell 8.4% in the past year.

Miami recorded the largest price decline, down 15.1%; followed by San Diego, down 13.4%; Las Vegas, down 13.2%; and Detroit, down 13%.

A tell-tale stat

Economist Steve Affinito told BloggingStocks Tuesday the Case-Shiller data is yet another tell-tale statistic regarding the condition of the U.S. housing sector.

"The song remains the same, and it's not a pleasant tune," Affinito said. "The Case-Shiller data shows a housing sector in deep recession, no doubt about it. We have an enormous oversupply as a result of the home construction overbuild and home owners in the market to sell who are not lowering the prices of their homes. Until everyone sets more-realistic sales price goals, those homes won't sell. And prices will not recover until that inventory is worked-off. We're a long way from that day."

Index co-developer Robert Shiller could not provide any encouragement, either.

"We reached another grim milestone in the housing market in November," Shiller, Chief Economist at MacroMarkets LLC said. "Not only did the 10-City Composite post another record low in its annual growth rate, but 13 of the 20 metro areas, each with data back to 1991, did the same. . . . Every MSA has now posted three consecutive monthly declines."

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Tags: Case Shiller, featured, home prices, HomePrices, housing

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)

1-29-2008 @ 3:35PM

phyllis said...

greedy America...look what you've become

2-08-2008 @ 5:36AM

py said...

The rich are the ones that can't get enough..I'm from a family that still believes in honest values! BUT....we will also be the ones paying rent to the "Kings" of govt. Between Layers and bankers the "GOOD PEOPLE" of America have nothing and still find someway to share. I think that bothers people that are greedy. I haven't always gotten what I've wanted....but I mostly have what I need. Always room at our table for one more. Please don't picture ALL Americans as those spoiled BRATS you see on the news. Please don't judge our morrals by the thieves that have "purchased" their way into our govt. Please don't go to NY and expect that person you meet will be the same as the person you might meet in Cali. We are NOT all the same!!

1-29-2008 @ 3:51PM

GIVERSandRECEIVERS said...

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1-29-2008 @ 5:07PM

LB said...

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1-31-2008 @ 9:07PM

ajm33771 said...

we are in tra-booo. truthfully the money policies from the FED and the Bubba-Ya Administration is what has put us in the predicament that we find ourselves in. A handful of greedy individuals, when compared to the percentage of the population, are the ones responsible for the sad state of affair we find ourselves in.

1-29-2008 @ 4:09PM

billy sands said...

Has it been so long that people forgot what a recession loks like?Capitalism is..or at least WAS cyclical there were or are ups and downs...I THINK THAT 7 YEAR BOOM IN THE 90'S UNDER cLINTON SPOILED US..

1-31-2008 @ 1:28PM

Jordan said...

I am a Realtor and I sure everyone is familiar with the trickle down theory. Greedy Lenders and impatient buyers are the two top groups to blame. If you go into surgery do you not ask the doctor what is the next step. The same applies for a loan. If it sounded to good to be true it now shows proof that it was. Not to mention that some people are filing foreclosure to move into there new home so they won't have to worry about selling the old one. If everyone took time to think about how this would effect everything else around them the buyers and lenders would have took more caution and revisited the long term effects. Can anyone say recession? If not how about depression!

1-29-2008 @ 5:34PM

james said...

most people today are concerned about the here an now. please ,the long term effect . greedy lender & greedy buyer.

1-29-2008 @ 7:25PM

ray zuppa said...

Get real. You know what a home is worth. Exactly what someone is willing to pay for it and nothing more.

This past summer I went through the joy of buying a house. Sellers are living in a fantasy land as evidenced by their asking prices. Realators committed fraud everday when they over valued the houses. Talk to them about the pending meltdown that is now before us and they denied it: "Homes are selling everyday." You won't see bottom for four years.

I ended up buying a house that dropped significantly in price because it didn't sell and the owner had to move because his job was transferred to Texas. He also was paying a mortgage on his home in Texas. I raped him. I even made him leave his plasma T.V. behind. I would still lose value on the home if I sold it today. That's why I'm not selling and I bought it in cash. Who needs to pay interest on a depreciating asset.

Sellers can hold out only so long before high property taxes catch up with their fixed incomes, etc. Then instead of getting a 1000% on the homes they bought 30 years ago they'll only get 10 times what they paid.

My heart aches for them.

1-29-2008 @ 4:19PM

vandyfanz said...

I really wish the media would stop making this look like a Nation-side problem...it is city/state specific. Nashville market is doing great! People still buying an selling everyday!

1-29-2008 @ 6:37PM

leland vandeventer said...

First of all, the media is being sensational and irresponsible making this so dramatic and making it seem like a problem everywhere. There are plenty of cities, like San Antonio, Texas and many others, where prices were not overly inflated and where the market would be fine if the media would shut up for a minute. Is the media totally out of anything to report except Britney's latest escapade and how the housing market will never recover? You said the same about stocks in 2001- saying that it would take 30 years for the market to every reach 12,000 again --- if indeed it ever did. The media was wrong, and you are wrong now too. Grow up and stop killing the housing market -- you are to blame -- not anybody else but you.

1-30-2008 @ 5:55PM

bukbuk1 said...

Can you give me specific numbers to show that the market is as good as it was last year please. I would like this city by city if possible.

1-29-2008 @ 4:25PM

charles wood said...

.... and yet the builders are still building new homes and local governments are still issuing new building permits. When is this insanity going to end ?

1-29-2008 @ 5:47PM

keith hilton said...

at the present time I am trying to sell a home in uk and like here they are not selling this home has been on market since end Aug(but I feel it is overpriced)
I own a home here which I paid the going rate for when it was built and you never need to worry about the price of a home if :
1 you are happy and living in it and
2 you only need to be concerned when it is your time to sell , no one ever complains when they are getting more than the house was paid for but please appreciate that at the same time you either rebuy a house that is either more money or less monet depending on the sales trend, Which regretably right now is down so if unhappy sit and wait sell when the price is up and live in a tent and then buy when the price goes down again.

1-29-2008 @ 6:36PM

Leigh said...

You are so right! The inventories of new houses from builders over-building is really hurting resale on the not so new homes, as the builders offer so many incentives! During the good market here in AZ the builders were selling the new homes $60 to $100 thous. over what they were worth. Now we all sit with an inequity! That isn't suppose to happen with a house, our value is suppose to go up!

1-29-2008 @ 4:35PM

Kent said...

There is a movement in suburban Chicago that every suburb, including filthy rich suburbs like Oak Brook and Lake Forest, should have affordable housing.

In other words, it's a right to live in any suburb, no matter what a person's income.

So, the fact that home prices are declining is going to make a lot of Chicago suburbs more affordable again.

And this decline in home prices isn't new. My parents bought their house in 1964 for $31,000. The sellers bought the house in 1959 for $36,000, a $5,000 loss for them. That's enough to have bought a fully-loaded Buick Electra.

My grandfather was a farmer, and he never bought land, when prices were skyrocketing. That is a formula for financial ruin, in his opinion. A couple of years of drought, and one couldn't afford the mortgage and property taxes. He waited until prices were plummeting, then he would go out and buy a few hunderd acres.

1-29-2008 @ 4:52PM

oldtimer said...

"There is a movement in suburban Chicago that every suburb, including filthy rich suburbs like Oak Brook and Lake Forest, should have affordable housing.

In other words, it's a right to live in any suburb, no matter what a person's income."

A person only has the right to live where he can afford to live.

1-29-2008 @ 4:58PM

Jim said...

Interesting how this coincides with the decease in illegal aliens comnig here.

1-29-2008 @ 4:42PM

Jack Hiehle said...

We are all victims of the Shrub Administration's monetary and economic policy of driving a "consumer economy" with borrowed money - such as "refinancing" cash-outs, created by lower-than-reasonable interest rates and a "privatized", uncontrolled, mortage lending market. We have been screwed by the "compasionate conservative"
scammers ... and a Government controlled by the stock jobbers of Wall Street. My sympathies to you all.

1-29-2008 @ 4:36PM

Toni said...

ROTF!!!!! They are crying because the price has dropped 6 to 14%?! They OVER INFLATED the values by 60% to begin with! There is no reason that a 30 or 40 year old home that sold for 60,000 a few years ago should now be priced at over 300,000! Peoples wages do not support these prices. If they want to sell homes, then they have to be priced at what the population in an area can afford based on the income in that area!