What is changing in the Denver market?

Home prices in the Denver area rose in August for the sixth straight month, and prices are now nearly where they were a year ago, according to Standard & Poor's closely watched S&P/Case-Shiller Home Prices Index.

Home prices in Denver rose 1.0 percent in August from the previous month, according to the index report, released Tuesday. That follows a 1.5 percent rise in July, a 2.5 percent month-over-month rise in June, a 1.3 percent increase in May and a 1.5 percent rise in April.
Denver home prices were down 1.9 percent in August compared with the same month in 2008.
Denver’s year-over-year decline in August was the second-smallest of any of the 20 U.S. cities tracked by the Case-Shiller Index, bested only by Dallas (a 1.2 percent decline from August 2008). All 20 cities declined to some extent. The steepest declines were in Las Vegas (down 29.9 percent year-over-year), Phoenix (down 25.1 percent) and Detroit (down 22.6 percent).

“Broadly speaking, the rate of annual decline in home price values continues to improve” David Blitzer, chairman of the Index Committee at Standard & Poor’s, said in a statement Tuesday.
“While many of the markets remain down versus this time last year, the relative rate of decline has shown some real improvement,” Blitzer said. “California, in particular, has seen some real positive prints in recent months. We see this general trend whether you look at the as-reported data or the seasonally adjusted figures.

“Once again, however, we do want to remind people of the upcoming expiration of the Federal First-Time Buyer’s Tax Credit in November and anticipated higher unemployment rates through year-end. Both may have a dampening effect on home prices.”
The index is compiled by comparing matched-price pairs for thousands of single-family homes in each market. Standard & Poor’s and Fiserv Inc. publishes it.