Once-Battered Market Now Price-Gain Leader

The Phoenix housing market, which was flooded with foreclosures and underwater home owners and saw home values dip greatly during the housing crisis, is coming back strong. Home values in metro Phoenix and the rest of the state of Arizona are posting the fastest growth rates in the nation, according to CoreLogic home value data, which includes foreclosures and short sales. In the Phoenix metro area, home values soared 11.3 percent year-over-year in April, marking the largest such gain out of the 10 largest U.S. metro areas. Dallas had the second-highest growth at 3.5 percent with home values year-over-year. Meanwhile, the states with the highest year-over-year increase in home values from April are Arizona (8.8 percent increase), District of Columbia (6.4 percent), Florida (5.5 percent), Montana (5.4 percent), and Utah (5.4 percent). Market on the Mend Overall, recent housing reports have shown that the housing market is picking up across the country. "Excluding distressed sales, home prices in March and April are improving at a rate not seen since late 2006 and appreciating at a faster rate than during the tax-credit boomlet in 2010," says Mark Fleming, chief economist for CoreLogic. "Nationally, the supply of homes in current inventory is down to 6.5 months, a level not seen in more than five years, in part driven by the ‘locked in’ position of so many home owners in negative equity." Source: “CoreLogic: Phoenix Leads the Nation in Home Value Gains,” Phoenix Business Journal Online (June 5, 2012)