FHFA: Home prices fall in all metro areas during 2011's third quarter

The House Price Index (HPI) fell from the third quarter of 2010 to the same period this year in every Colorado metro area, including Boulder, Colorado Springs, Denver-Aurora, Fort Collins-Loveland, Grand Junction, Greeley and Pueblo.

The first quarter HPI data, released last month by the Federal Housing Finance Agency for hundreds of metropolitan areas nationwide, shows continued declines in home prices across Colorado.

Nationally and statewide, the HPI has also declined, with Colorado showing smaller declines that the nation overall. (See the analysis here.)

Year over year, the 1-year changes in each metro area were:
Boulder -1.6%
Colo Springs -5.0%
Denver-Aurora -2.7%
Fort Coll-Loveland -1.3%
Grand Junction -11%
Greeley -2.1%
Pueblo -6.14%

The first graph shows the year-over-year change in each region for each quarter. For the sake of visual clarity, the graph only shows data back to 2009.



Since the third quarter of 2008, the year-over-year changes have been generally negative. The graph also shows us that:

-Greeley has been the only area to show a year-over-year increase since the fourth quarter of 2010.

-Grand Junction has consistently shown the largest decreases in recent years.

-The Ft Collins-Loveland area has tended to show the smallest decreases in recent years.

The second graph shows the actual HPI values for each quarter going back to 2000. In general, the HPI began to plateau during 2007 and was declining in most areas by 2008. A big exception in the Grand Junction area which continued to increase rapidly well into 2008.



Since the peak period of the first quarter of 2007, the HPI has fallen in all regions. The following shows how far the house price index is below peak levels in each area.

Boulder -0.9
Colo Springs -10.7
Denver-Aurora -6.1
Fort Coll-Loveland -1.3
Grand Junction -25.5
Greeley -0.03
Pueblo -5.16

This report overall suggests that while there is a fair amount of price stability in many areas of Colorado, prices continue to fall. When compared with Case-Shiller and local Metrolist data, we can say that through the third quarter of 2011, and into the fourth quarter, weakness in demand for for-purchase housing persists, but that losses in value are diminishing in each new time period.

The index values presented and analyzed in this article are not seasonally adjusted. The data in this article is taken from the FHFA "all-transactions" data. The index is based on home price data obtained through the GSEs such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.