Valley resale prices are still showing signs of a recovering Arizona housing market

Valley resale prices are still showing signs of a recovering Arizona housing market.  According to ASU professor Karl Guntermann, Arizona State University's Repeat Sales Index is on the verge of stabilizing, despite thousands of homeowners who are still losing the battle against foreclosure.  The Index has been dropping consecutively for the last 34 months since home prices peaked in 2006.  If the trend continues, resale home value decreases will likely come to an end in just a few more months.  The Repeat Sales Index measures the difference in the average price of selected homes from year to year.  An index of zero percent would mean that prices were roughly the same as they were a year earlier.  By looking at the table below, if the trend continues, we could have a Repeat Sales Index of zero by June of this year, although the decline has slowed down from 4% over the last two months to 2% for February estimates.  "The total decline of Valley home prices from the peak in mid 2006 is 47 percent", said Guntermann.

* Preliminary Data

As far as foreclosures go, that index of zero may be reached very soon.  In November the index for foreclosed homes was 9 percent.  By December the numbers show the index falling to 5 percent.  January and  February estimates show the foreclosure index falling to 2 percent.

The median sales price of homes has started to increase again, after falling in December and January.  By looking at the table, you can see that the median sales price had been on the rise, from a low of $117,500 in April to $135,000 by November.   Last year it took till May before we saw an increase in the median sales price, and this year we see an increase already in the preliminary numbers for February.  The median price for February is already up to $127,000 from $121,000 in February of 2009.