Housing Prices Fall for 8th Consecutive Month

U.S. housing prices continued their downward slide in August 2007, according to the latest S&P/Case-Shiller housing indices released this morning. The 10-city composite index — the original composite index before a 20-city composite was introduced earlier this year — fell 5 percent from year-ago levels and is at its lowest value since June 1991. A newer 20-city composite recorded a decline of 4.4 percent. The August price drop is the eighth consecutive month of price drops, according to Standard and Poor’s, and the 21st consecutive month of decelerating prices. “At both the national and metro area levels, the fall in home prices is showing no real signs of a slowdown or turnaround,” says Robert J. Shiller, Chief Economist at MacroMarkets LLC. “Year-over-year and monthly price returns are continuing to either move deeper into negative territory or are experiencing persistent diminishing returns. There is really no positive news in today’s report, as most of the metro areas are showing declining or vanishing returns on both an annual and monthly basis. Only two metro areas – Denver and Detroit – showed improvement in their annual returns and even those were reports of slightly less negative numbers.” Below is a table showing each metro region tracked by the indices: It’s worth noting in the above that a good number of markets are now approaching double-digit year-over-year price declines by the Case-Shiller measures.