Home prices across the country continued to climb in August but at a significantly slower rate than in prior months, rising at an annualized 12 percent from July. This marks the second consecutive month of slowing month-over-month appreciation, according to homegenius Home Price Index (HPI) data.
After setting an all-time high for monthly appreciation at 18.8 percent in June (annualized), appreciation rates have slowed more than 35 percent from that peak.
“Over the last two months, the impact of major increases in mortgage rates and inflation have finally been realized in the slowing rate of home price appreciation. It is once again clear that home prices are not impervious to the broader economic conditions around the country,” homegenius Real Estate Senior Vice President of Products, Data and Analytics Steve Gaenzler said in a release. “However, the rate of appreciation is still well above the historical norm, at more than 12 percent month-over-month. While it is likely that appreciation rates will continue to drop, homeowners’ equity remains at all-time highs and inventory remains tight.”
Home prices have risen at an annualized rate of 8 percent over the last six months and 15.9 percent over the last three months.
Nationally, the median estimated price for single-family homes and condos rose to $338,692. Since the onset of the pandemic thirty months ago, homes have appreciated, on average, by more than $88,000. Home prices have appreciated by 16.7 percent over the last 12 months and 8 percent over the last six months.
homegenius data shows that the record rates of appreciation during the pandemic appear to be waning quickly. Over the last month, price appreciation slowed to 12 percent. While that is significantly slower than the prior month’s 16.5 percent appreciation, August home price appreciation matches the average monthly appreciation rate since the start of the pandemic. This month’s annualized rate of appreciation does, however, represent the slowest appreciation rate since March 2022 (11.3 percent).
In August, all six of homegenius’ regional indices recorded slower home price appreciation rates relative to the prior month. The MidAtlantic and Northeast markets were the strongest performers last month, while the West and South showed the strongest slowdown in appreciation.
There were slightly more than 1.01 million properties listed for sale in August, which was the second-lowest level of inventory for any August over the last decade, and 40 percent lower than the average level of August listings over the last 15 years.
Roughly 290,000 homes were purchased in August, compared with 278,000 in July. While August is often the highest sales month, homegenius noted, this year the pace of combined sales for July and August was much lower than is typical for the busy summer homebuying season. The last time a summer month reported less than 278,000 sales was in 2014. This year, the average sales per month in the summer was 293,000.
All 20 of the largest metro areas in the U.S. recorded slower annual price appreciation in August than in July. The largest decline was in San Francisco, which dropped to just 1.3 percent appreciation (annualized). Los Angeles had the second-slowest appreciation rate, with a 5.7 percent increase month-over-month.
Cities in Texas and Florida fared the best of large metros. Florida cities on both coasts recorded month-over-month appreciation rates above 15 percent (Tampa 16.3 percent, Miami 16.5 percent). On average, the top 20 largest metros increased by 9.8 percent in July. Over the last year, the average large metro increase was 12.6 percent.