The fourth quarter is usually the quietest period of each year for the housing market, and with mortgage rates hitting 22-year highs in the fourth quarter of 2023, existing home sales slumped to their lowest since 1995. Only the most capable buyers and most motivated sellers were active during the period, and home values saw less of a seasonal decline than typical.
March 8, 2024 - HSH.com released today an updated Home Value Tracker, the firm's quarterly analysis of home values changes in the nation’s top 400 metropolitan housing markets. Developed by HSH, a premier consumer destination for mortgage information and shopping since 1979, HVT reveals the 10 metropolitan areas with the fastest annual home price increases and the 10 with the smallest annual gains -- or largest declines. HSH also offers a custom-time-period lookup tool for value changes in over 400 metropolitan areas.
HSH's recurring evaluation reviews home value changes in more than 400 of the most populous metropolitan areas, displaying home value changes for each compared to the previous quarter and previous two quarters as well as over the last one-, three- and five-year periods. A home value lookup tool allows users to see their local market's changes over these fixed time points.
HSH Also makes available a custom-time-period lookup tool called Home Value Tracker-MyHVT allows users to see how values have changed in any of the 400 metros during any time period from 1995 to now, allowing them to see what's happened to the value of their home during the time they've owned it.
The MyHVT tool allows homeowners to enter the purchase price of their home and the quarter in which they purchased it, then calculates changes in the home's value during this ownership period, producing a current price estimate based on home value trends in the selected metro area over the selected time period.
While mortgage rates ended the fourth quarter much lower much lower than where they began it, the decline was only sufficient to return them to a level seen in the second quarter of 2023. However, as the number of homes available to buy also saw its usual seasonal thinning, the decline in rates helped create enough demand as to keep home sellers asking for and receiving top dollar for their homes to close the year, keeping home values elevated.
In the fourth quarter of 2023, twenty-eight metro area saw home values decline compared to a year ago, while 209 markets saw typical seasonal value declines on quarter-to-quarter basis. During the same period a year ago, 231 metro areas saw home values with seasonal softening, so home values remained very well supported the year closed and the spring homebuying season approached.
Potential homebuyers still face challenging market conditions with little expectation that home affordability will materially improve anytime soon. Even with mortgage rates high, there remains plenty of demand for homes and little supply, so home values won't retreat meaningfully unless demand declines even more steeply, as might be the case in a recession. Neither home sellers nor home buyers would wish for those economic conditions, and many markets endured economic difficulty that outright declines in home values can produce not all that long ago.
| Value changes from a sampling of major metro areas | Percent value change since 4Q22 |
| Austin-Round Rock-Georgetown. TX | -3.53% |
| Casper, WY | 8.15% |
| Gulfport-Biloxi. MS | 4.90% |
| Knoxville, TN | 8.95% |
| Portland-South Portland. ME | 9.19%% |
| Sacramento-Roseville-Folsom, CA | 2.78% |
See the full set of more than 400 metro areas here: https://www.hsh.com/home-value-tracker.html
HSH.com’s Home Value Tracker uses the Federal Housing Finance Agency's (FHFA) Home Price Index for insight on changes to housing market values. HVT is based on an "all transactions" index involving conforming, conventional mortgages purchased or securitized by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac and includes both purchase and refinance transactions. The data does not include property transactions backed by FHA, VA, USDA or private-market non-conforming (i.e. jumbo) mortgages.
About HSH.com
Since 1979, HSH.com has been a trusted mortgage resource for consumers seeking independent, objective and expert-level mortgage information, forecasts and data. HSH.com offers unique analysis, calculators, tools and content to help demystify first mortgages, home equity loans and lines of credit, reverse mortgages and more. HSH.com empowers homebuyers and homeowners to fully understand their home financing choices and provide opportunities for them to engage with partners to execute their transactions.
Website: https://www.hsh.com
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