The good news continued for Texas home prices, according to the latest Case-Shiller.

Home prices in the Lone Star State continued their ascent through May, according to the latest Case-Shiller Home Price Indices from Standard & Poor’s.

Amazingly, S&P does not track home prices for Houston, but it does follow the Dallas market, where the news was uniformly good – not only were prices up 8.6 percent year-over-year in Dallas, but the area’s 1.3 percent monthly growth from April to May pushed its local index to an all-time high.

A National Slowdown in Housing Prices

On the national scene, though, home prices continued to show signs of slowing down:

• The 10- and 20-City Composites increased 9.4 and 9.3 percent, respectively, from last year.
• Though surely a positive development, those increases are well below expectations, and down substantially from the 10.9 and 10.8 percent returns from the last Case-Shiller.
• With the exception of Charlotte and Tampa, every metro area saw its annual rates decelerate.

Blitzer – “Slowest Pace Since February 2013”

David M. Blitzer, the chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices, said the latest Case-Shiller is the latest sign yet of a schizophrenic housing recovery.

“Home prices rose at their slowest pace since February of last year,” Blitzer said. “The 10- and 20-City Composites posted just over 9 percent, well below expectations.

“Housing has been turning in mixed economic numbers in the last few months,” Blitzer continued. “Prices and sales of existing homes have shown improvement while construction and sales of new homes continue to lag. At the same time, the broader economy and especially employment are showing larger improvements and substantial gains.”