Sunday, December 23, 2007

Home Price Indices Coming in Next Week.

The Case Schiller home price index is due to be released the day after Christmas. On Dec. 31st the National Association of Realtors is then scheduled to release their existing home price sale index.

It will be interesting to see whether the Portland Metro area continues to buck the national trend of declining prices in these releases. (Given typical lower holiday seasonal sales volumes I would advise caution in reacting too much to one months worth of data).

One wild card in all of the data is the extent to which discounted sales may or may not be reflected in recorded sales data. As in the case of the rental market when "x months free rent" is offered to lease up units quickly, inducements to sell can mask real declines in discounted sales prices and there is no easy way to evaluate the extent of that discounting in any market or time period.

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