Source: Yahoo! News —
Homebuyers are finally gaining leverage in the housing market, but where they can get the best discounts on home prices varies from metro to metro.
Some of the most popular pandemic boomtowns such as Phoenix and Seattle, plus perennially popular West Coast cities like San Jose and San Francisco, posted home price declines of more than 10% from their 2022 peaks, according to December data from mortgage technology and data provider Black Knight Inc. That outpaced the average national decline of 5.3%, off their June 2022 peaks.
That’s a welcome sign for some buyers who are taking advantage of newfound purchasing power and seller incentives in today’s market. Still, affordability remains a significant challenge this year, as home prices and still-high mortgage rates continue to dampen demand.
“We’re finally seeing real price corrections,” John Downs, senior vice president of Vellum Mortgage, told Yahoo Finance. “Home prices remain high, but they are better now and dropping.”
Overvalued markets will see sharpest declines
After mortgage rates surged to nearly 7% last year, home price growth began to slump across the country. As of December 2022, home prices had registered their sixth consecutive monthly decline – and Black Knight predicts those decreases will likely extend through 2023.
Approximately 14 of the 50 largest markets are already showing signs of a sharp cooldown, the report found, with home prices falling by an average 6% or more from their 2022 peaks on a seasonally-adjusted basis. Among the metros evaluated, prices declined at a sharper rate in the West.
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