Black Knight's HPI Holds on to Late Year Gains

Black Knight Financial Services reported on Monday that its Home Price Index posted another 5.7 percent annual increase in the national rate of appreciation.  Over the course of 2016 prices rose on a year-over-year basis by an average of 5.4 percent each month, however appreciation accelerated into the later months and the December increase tied with November for the highest rates of the year.  The November to December gain was 0.1 percent, down from the 0.2 percent rate in each of the previous two months.

Home prices in four of the nation's 20 largest states, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, and Washington, hit new peaks as did seven of the 40 largest metropolitan areas.

The highest rate of monthly appreciation among the states, 1.2 percent, was again in New York which has led for the last six months.  Other top performing states lagged New York, with number 2, Washington, posting an 0.5 percent gain and the others, New Jersey, Kansas, Vermont, Maine, South Dakota, Hawaii, Mississippi, and Arkansas all coming in with increases of 0.4 or 0.3 percent. 

In Michigan prices were down 0.7 percent in December and the state accounted for eight of the 10 worst performing metropolitan areas. Alabama, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, New Hampshire, Missouri, Montana, Delaware, and Kentucky also posted month-over-month losses.

New York State was home to eight of the 10 best performing metropolitan areas, New York City, Utica, Kingston, Buffalo, Binghamton, Syracuse, Albany, and Elmira, with increases of 1.1 to 0.7 percent.  Kennewick, Washington was the fifth best performing metro with a 0.8 percent gain and Gainesville Georgia was number 10 at 0.7 percent.  

The Black Knight HPI utilizes repeat sales data from public records and its own loan-level mortgage performance data from both disclosure and non-disclosure states.