Housing Improving but Seemingly never Recovered
The topline news while accurate is also growing monotonous: housing market continues to improve. Freddie Mac added another chapter to the seemingly endless tale today with its updated Multi-Indicator Market Index or MiMi. The index measures where national, state, and the top 100 metropolitan housing markets stand relative to each one's own stable range of housing activity and whether it is trending toward or further away from that point.
The national MiMi improved by 1.33 percent from May to June and shows a three-month change of +2.26 percent and 5.41 percent year-over-year. The MiMi value at the end of June was 80.3, up 35 percent from its low point in October 2010 but significantly below its high of 121.7.
The MiMi shows the U.S. housing market continuing to slowly stabilize with two more states, Arkansas and Tennessee entering their outer range of stable housing activity, thus joining 18 other states and the District of Columbia. The District tops the list with a MiMi of 101.7 followed by North Dakota, Montana, Hawaii, California and Utah. Omaha, Scranton, Chattanooga, and Madison, Wisconsin raised the number of metropolitan areas in stable range to 46 with Fresno, Austin, Honolulu, Salt Lake City, and Los Angeles in the top five, None of their MiMi readings have yet reached 100.
In June, 45 of the 50 states and 95 of the 100 metros were showing an improving three month trend. The same time last year, 33 of the 50 states plus the District of Columbia, and 80 of the top 100 metro areas were showing an improving three-month trend.
Freddie Mac Deputy Chief Economist Len Kiefer said "Housing markets are the strongest they've been in years with the National MiMi above 80 for the first time since 2008. Nationally, all MiMi indicators are heading in the right direction. Robust homebuyer demand has put total home sales on pace for the best year since 2007 and look for that trend to continue as the MiMi purchase applications indicator remains on the upswing. The West has been especially strong, with many markets posting double-digit growth in their MiMi purchase applications indicator compared to a year ago.
"While home prices are still 7 percent below peak values nationally, price indices in many markets are at all-time highs and current low interest rates are helping to support homebuyer affordability," Kiefer said. "Mortgage delinquencies are coming down rapidly, but are still high in many markets. Those markets hardest hit by the Great Recession, including many in Florida, are rebounding but they still need to improve to get delinquencies back in line with their benchmark historic averages. The key driver of all this recovery has been solid job growth, with 96 out of 100 metros and all states within range of their benchmark historic average unemployment rate."
MiMi combines proprietary Freddie Mac data with current local market data to assess where each single-family housing market is relative to its own long-term stable range by looking at home purchase applications, payment-to-income ratios (changes in home purchasing power based on house prices, mortgage rates and household income), proportion of on-time mortgage payments in each market, and the local employment picture. The four indicators are combined to create a composite MiMi value for each market. A market can fall outside its stable range by being too weak to generate enough demand for a well-balanced housing market or by overheating to an unsustainable level of activity.