Home prices in the United States spiked 5.4 percent year over year in the second quarter, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) house price index (HPI), released Tuesday. Prices increased in every single U.S. city except for San Francisco.
Prices, according to the data, climbed 0.8 percent from the first quarter of 2020 to the second quarter, despite the COVID-19 headwinds and accompanying uncertainty. It was also the 36th straight quarter of year-over-year increases.
“Home prices grew by 5.4 percent in the second quarter of 2020 compared to a year ago, despite the impacts of COVID-19,” Dr. Lynn Fisher, deputy director of the division of research and statistics at FHFA, said in a statement. “Although house prices fell slightly in May relative to April, in June prices rebounded by 0.9 percent over the month as local economies re-opened and transactions picked up again.”
Prices rose in all 50 states and the District of Columbia on an annual basis in the second quarter. Idaho led the way with a 10 percent increase in home prices, followed by Arizona, Washington, Utah and New Mexico. West Virginia saw the smallest increase at 1.1 percent.
Prices rose in 99 of the top 100 cities tracked by FHFA. Urban Honolulu, Hawaii, where prices rose 11.7 percent, saw the biggest increase. San Francisco was the only city to see prices actually decrease, at 0.3 percent year over year.
The HPI, according to the FHFA, is, “a weighted, repeat-sales index, meaning that it measures average price changes in repeat sales or refinancings on the same properties. This information is obtained by reviewing repeat mortgage transactions on single-family properties whose mortgages have been purchased or securitized by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac since January 1975.”
