Home price recovery index: Which metros have improved the most, least?

Four years ago in September 2021, homes in all of the top 100 housing markets fully recovered any value they lost during the last housing bust, and overall, home values have only continued to climb since then, often rapidly. However, as they move at various speeds, that doesn't mean there still isn't a race to the top... and up from the bottom, too.

It also doesn't mean that home values can't or won't decline in some areas, at least on a quarter-to-quarter basis, if not over a longer time period.

The geographic mix of markets with the greatest value increases since previous price peaks occurred continues to change, as does the group of areas where home value improvement has taken longer and been more meager. While home values in all markets are above the peaks of the last boom, at least some areas are less so of late, as values in some metropolitan have retreated a bit from pandemic-fueled record highs.

HSH.com’s Home Price Recovery Index uses a Federal Housing Finance Agency's (FHFA) Home Price Index as a basis to determine which of the top 100 housing markets have fully recovered value lost (or more) in the last housing bust and where values in each market stand in relation to their mid-aughts peaks. The time period covered by the HPI begins with the first quarter of 1991 and runs through the second quarter of 2025. We compare the metro's previous peak value from the mid-2000s housing boom against present values to determine if a given market has recovered all of the value lost during the subsequent 2011-2013 housing market bust, and how much above previous high-water marks a market is now.

Quarterly update
The second quarter of each year typically sees most if not all metro areas post their record high values for each year, rising as they do when the spring homebuying season gets fully underway. That's less so the case this year, as a sluggish pace of existing home sales is starting to see at least some metros sporting lower home values, and not only on a quarter-to-quarter basis.

Declines in home values have been broadening, and on a quarter-to-quarter basis, there were 56 metropolitan housing markets with lower values in the second quarter than in the first and some by a fair amount. Quarterly vagaries aren't uncommon as values wax and wane with market activity, but it is unusual to see so many of them occurring in the second quarter of a year, typically the busiest time for sales, and when selling prices reach their annual peaks.

In comparing the second quarter of this year against the last six such periods, the number of metros with quarter to quarter declines in home values is more than double the next closest entrant. Last year's second-quarter (2Q24) total was 25 metros with lower home values compared to the first quarter. The second quarter of 2020's saw 26 markets with a quarterly value decline, but as that period was the most affected by the hard pandemic shutdown, it's difficult to make a direct comparison. Regardless, the quarterly deceleration in home values this year is certainly more widespread.

Annual comparisons suggest things are changing, too. This more widely utilized time reference reveals that there were 22 of the top 100 housing markets where home values were lowers this year than last. This is the second largest second quarter total six-year second-quarter comparison period, bested only by 2023's 26 metro housing markets with value reductions. Year over year declines were concentrated in southern and western markets, including six in Florida, four in California and three in Texas. Georgia, Colorado, North Carolina, South Carolina, Arizona and Washington, DC round out the list.

Across markets that declined in value the average value reduction was 2.82%; across those that increased, the average gain was 3.66%. Quarter-to-quarter, similar balance was seen, with the 56 deckling metros easing by an average 1.58%, while the 44 metros with value increases gained an average of 1.08%. However, averages mask some considerably larger decreases and increases, such as the 7.96% year-over-year decline in the Cape Coral-Ft. Myers, FL metro area or the 8.28% increase in the Rochester, NY market.

Most recovered group
The shifting landscape of home value increases caused some shuffling of the ranks in the group with the largest value gains since the housing bust's bottom. The upward run for home values is starting to change, and sizable quarterly or annual gains in value are starting to become more rare. That's most definitely the case across the group with the most sizable improvement in value since they reached individual value bottoms, where seven of ten of these metro areas saw quarter-to-quarter declines in home values, with three of those also sporteding year-over-year decreases.

There was one change this quarter in the markets represented in our "most recovered" group, as solid home value increases in the Grand Rapids-Wyoming-Kentwood, MI market moved it into the 10 slot of the top group at the expense of the Boise City, ID market, which exited the group this quarter.

Other than that, all the other metros swapped slots, as Nashville-Davidson-Murfreesboro-Franklin, TN moved up tot he #1 position, pushing Denver-Aurora-Centennial, CO down to #2. Dallas-Plano-Irving, TX may have had a quarterly (and yearly) decline in value, but it was less than the Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, TX area, and so Dallas moved up to #3 and Austin down to #4. The Buffalo-Cheektowaga, NY metro area continues to sneak its way higher in the list, rising from the #7 position to #5, nudging the Fort Worth-Arlington-Grapevine, TX market out of its perch and down a notch to #6. The Knoxville, TN and Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC-SC metros moved up to fill the #7 and #9 positions, pressing the Greenville-Anderson-Greer, SC down to the ninth slot.

Home values changes becoming to be more of a mixed bag means more opportunity for change in the "most recovered" list, but all of these metros have home values that are in excess of 143% of their prior value peaks. As such, it'll take some softening of values in the top group of metros and some strengthening in value by those metros just outside it to effect any change in the "most recovered" list.

Although it just dropped out, the metro with the best shot to rise back up into the most recovered group is the Boise City, ID area, which stands just outside the top 10 with a 142.27% increase over its previous peak value After that, the gap widens considerably, with the next metro in line (Marietta, GA) trailing Boise by more than nine percentage points.

10 metro areas that have recovered the most

Least recovered areas
The metro areas with the least improvement in home values since the prior peak also saw a mixed bag in terms of value changes for the second quarter of 2025. On a quarterly basis, seven of these areas saw some value loss, and theee (Cape Coral-Fort Myers, FL, Sacramento-Roseville-Folsom, CA and Stockton-Lodi, CA) also saw annual declines in value.

The Stockton-Lodi, CA area is now the metro with the smallest value gain since the last housing boom, with home values here 25.36% above the peak levels attained way back in the third quarter of 2005. It's hard to reckon that this market's prior "boom-era" high was almost 20 years ago, but it's also worth considering that this area didn't even reach a "fully recovered" state until the first quarter of 2021. This metro's value gain is now more than 3% lower than it was one year ago.

Retiring the HPRI
As we've noted in the opening paragraph, with home prices in all 100 metros surpassing their mid-aughts' boom-era price peaks a few years back, there is actually no more "recovery" in our Home Price Recovery Index.

We expect to track the "most recovered" group for a while longer yet, and of course, HSH's Home Value Estimator (MyHPI) will continue to be updated, so you can track changes in your favorite metro as we go along.

That said, we actually developed a new means of following changes in home values. Our Home Value Tracker (HVT) uses a different set of FHFA data that includes both repeat purchases and refinances, so it's a very robust data set. However, as there is no "refinancing season" (and in fact, no refinancing at times at all) the data is not seasonally adjusted and so can be more volatile from quarter to quarter.

Home Value Tracker covers more than four times the metro areas as does our HPRI, covering 409 metros in all, and provides five value-change reference points -- change from last quarter, two quarters ago and one, three and five years ago. HVT contains two tables showing the metros with the 10 largest and 10 smallest changes in home values over the last year, and provides a unique lookup tool so you can see your local market's changes over those time points, too.

HVT also features a custom-time-period tracking tool Home Value Tracker-MyHVT, where you can see what's happened to home values in any of the 400+ metros over any time frame you like from 1995 to now.

How has your home value changed in the time you've owned it?
While HSH's Home Price Recovery Index only reviews trough-to-peak value changes for each market, your experience in value change from when you purchased your home to today will of course be different. To see what's happened with home prices during the time you've owned your home, check our home value estimator, MyHPI. To see where you are in your mortgage, use our mortgage amortization calculator.

Tracking and projecting your home equity
The combination of home price increases and your retirement of the amount you owe may see you with a larger equity stake than you think. If you're interested in how much equity you've got in your home or are looking to pursue a future home equity goal, you'll want to check out our Home Equity Calculator and Projector.

Can some locations or properties still not have achieved recovery?

Since the HPRI compares values that are derived from an entire metropolitan area (some of these quite expansive) it's certainly possible that some homes or neighborhoods have not participated in the home price recovery as strongly as other areas in the same metro. In fact, and although it continues to diminish, CoreLogic reported that in the first quarter of 2025, the total number of residential properties with negative equity was still 1.2 million homes, or 2.1% of all mortgaged properties.

Regardless, the problem of at least some homeowners being "underwater" still persists and may worsen if homebuying conditions don't improve.

However, even if home prices don't increase for such homes or areas, homeowners will eventually come to a positive equity position as they make regular payments on their mortgages, and even small improvements in home values over time will tend to help fill in any temporary loss of value. In this way, even if the value of a specific home hasn't yet returned to a previous high, it's not as though the homeowner won't ever have any equity.

For example, in the case of a home purchased at a previous price peak in early 2006 (and assuming no refinance of the mortgage) the homeowner would have paid off about 42 percent of the original loan amount by now. This calculation doesn't include any downpayment the homeowner may have made, so any equity stake would be increased by that amount, too. Purchases made before the peak period or after prices began to descend would see this equity stake be increased as well. Given interest rates in place in 2006 -- 30-year FRMs were t about 6.5% in the third quarter -- odds favor that a homeowner would have refinanced at least once (if not twice) by now to take advantage of falling rates. A refinance in September 2012 to a 3.5% interest rate for example would still see the homeowner with more than a 38% retirement of principal by now.

All now recovered, the remaining 90 metro areas

Here's a look at the remaining 90 metro areas from the FHFA's HPI list.

More about the HPI

The Home Price Index is a broad measure of the movement of single-family house prices. It has been published by the Federal Housing Finance Agency and precursor agencies since the fourth quarter of 1995.

For each market, the index uses 1991 home prices as a basis. Those dollars are "normalized" to a value of 100 for each market; that is, regardless of the actual dollar amount, the index value for a given market becomes 100. For example, a home price in Allentown, PA in 1991 might have been $65,000; this becomes a base value for Allentown of 100, and changes since then are presented as percentage changes from that initial 100 value.

The HPI is based on purchase-only transactions involving conforming, conventional mortgages purchased or securitized by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. Only mortgage transactions on single-family properties are included. The HPI does not include property transactions backed by FHA, VA, USDA or non-conforming (e.g. jumbo) mortgages.

The HPI is updated each quarter as additional mortgages are purchased or securitized by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

The HPI is a weighted, repeat-sales index, meaning that it measures average price changes in repeat sales of the same properties.

The HPI shows the relative change in prices in a metropolitan area from quarter to quarter or period to period. HSH.com has pulled out information from each area to show the amount of change from 1991 to the pre-housing-crisis peak, the low achieved during or after the peak, and how much improvement has taken place since that near-term bottom.

The FHFA uses the revised Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) and Divisions as defined by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in Bulletin 23-01. If specified criteria are met and an MSA contains a single core population greater than 2.5 million, the MSA is divided into Metropolitan Divisions.

For more details on the HPI and how it is put together, see https://www.fhfa.gov/faqs/hpi?tab=methodology