Federal report says that D-FW home prices were up last year

Federal report says that D-FW home prices were up last year

Prices of homes purchased in the Dallas area rose by a smidgen in 2009, according to a federal report released Thursday.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency said that Dallas area home sale prices were up 0.43 percent at the end of last year compared with a year earlier. Nationwide, prices were down 1.2 percent in the same period.

Unlike other home price comparisons, the federal housing study only looks at home purchases financed with mortgages held by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – the big government-owned loan investors.

Dallas was one of three top 10 U.S. metro areas that had home price gains in 2009, according to the federal index.

Washington, D.C., had the biggest price increase at 10.55 percent, followed by a 3.71 percent increase in Houston.

Among major cities, the biggest price declines last year were in Miami, down 12.86 percent, and Phoenix, down 12.03 percent, according to the FHFA.

The quarterly federal housing index is different from the recently released Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller Home Price Index, which tracks the values of actual houses over time. The Case-Shiller index does not look at new home prices, which are included in the federal price measure.

Case-Shiller said that Dallas-area home prices were up 3 percent at the end of 2009 compared to a year earlier.

Dallas home prices are up about 12 percent during the last five years, the FHFA report said. And since 1991, overall home prices here have risen by more than 74 percent.

The country’s 10 largest home markets averaged a 3.7 percent price drop since 2004, according to the federal index But since 1991, home prices in the top 10 U.S. metro areas are up an average of 96 percent.