Home prices increased in February and will only continue that upward trend, according to the Home Price Index and HPI Forecast from CoreLogic, a global property information, analytics and data-enabled solutions provider.
Home prices increased 7% from February 2016 and increased 1% from January to February, according to the index.
“Home prices and rents have risen the most in local markets with high demand and limited supply, such as Seattle, Portland and Denver,” CoreLogic Chief Economist Frank Nothaft said. “The rise in housing costs has been largest for lower-tier-priced homes.”
“For example, from December to February in Seattle, the CoreLogic Home Price Index rose 12% and our single-family rent index rose 6% for all price tiers compared with the same period a year earlier,” Nothaft said. “However, when looking at only lower-cost homes in Seattle, the price increase was 13% and the rent increase was 7%.”
And home prices will continue going up a forecasted 4.7% on a year-over-year basis and 0.4% month-over-month, according to the HPI.
The CoreLogic HPI Forecast is a projection of home prices using the CoreLogic HPI and other economic variables. Values are derived from state-level forecasts by weighting indices according to the number of owner-occupied households for each state.
“Home prices continue to grow at a torrid pace so far in 2017 and these gains are likely to continue well into the future,” CoreLogic President and CEO Frank Martell said. “Home prices are at peak levels in many major markets and the appreciation is being driven by a number of dynamics—high demand, stronger employment, lean supplies and affordability—that will continue to play out in the coming years.”
“The CoreLogic Home Price Index is projecting an additional 5% rise in home prices nationally over the next 12 months,” Martell said.
And these rising home prices are increasing homeowner equity, causing a new rise in home equity lines of credit lead by the Millennial generation.
