The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) House Price Index (HPI) revealed 2018 third-quarter new house prices increased 1.3 percent and house prices rose 6.3 percent from the third quarter of 2017 to the third quarter of this year.
“Home prices continued to rise in the third quarter, but their upward pace is slowing somewhat,” William Doerner, supervisory economist, said. “Rising mortgage rates have cooled down housing markets—several regions and over two-thirds of states are showing slower annual gains.”
The HPI determined home prices rose in all 50 states and the District of Columbia between the third quarter of 2017 and the third quarter of 2018, noting home prices rose in 99 of the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the nation over the last four quarters.
Annual price increases were greatest in Boise City, Idaho, where prices increased by 20.1 percent while prices were weakest in Honolulu, Hawaii, where they fell by 5.2 percent.
FHFA’s HPI tracks changes in home values for individual properties owned or guaranteed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac over the past 43 years using more than eight million repeat transactions.
The repeat-transactions methodology constructs index estimates by statistically evaluating price appreciation or depreciation for homes with multiple values over time.