US Home Price Appreciation and Price-to-Rent Ratio: August 2018


Nationally, home price appreciation continued in August. Based on a seasonally adjusted annual growth rate, home prices in Seattle, New York and San Diego declined faster in August than in July. Home prices in New York has decreased for the fifth consecutive month.

The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index, reported by S&P Dow Jones Indices, rose at a seasonally adjusted annual growth rate of 7.2% in August, following an unusual 0.5% annual rate in July. On a year-over-year basis, the S&P Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price NSA Index rose by 5.8%, the lowest annual gain in the past twelve months. The Home Price Index, released by the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), rose at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.1% in August, slower than the 4.4% increase in July.

Elsewhere, in October 2004, Fed economist John Krainer and researcher Chishen Wei wrote a Fed letter on price to rent ratios: House Prices and Fundamental Value. Kainer and Wei presented a price-to-rent ratio using the OFHEO house price index and the Owners’ Equivalent Rent (OER) from the BLS, said Bill McBride on Calculated Risk Wednesday.

Here is a similar graph using the Case-Shiller National and Composite 20 House Price Indexes.

This graph shows the price to rent ratio (January 2000 = 1.0).

On a price-to-rent basis, the Case-Shiller National index is back to February 2004 levels, and the Composite 20 index is back to November 2003 levels.

In real terms, prices are back toย mid 2004 levels,ย andย the price-to-rent ratio isย back to late 2003, early 2004.
Read more at https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2018/10/real-house-prices-and-price-to-rent.html#p8ux2OwKepTE2vRy.99