Austin, Oakland, New Orleans, San Francisco, Birmingham, Washington DC, Fort Myers, Denver, Portland, and Phoenix.

By Wolf Richter for WOLF STREET.

Different housing markets don’t move in lockstep, except when money is free and FOMO reigns. And when the free money washed over the land from 2020 into 2022, in form of mortgage rates far below the rate of inflation, prices exploded in all markets together in near-lockstep. But this has ended, and in many markets, prices have begun to sag.

So here are 10 bigger cities where prices of single-family homes have declined more seriously, seasonally adjusted, after the gigantic price explosion over the prior few years. Of these 10 cities, 8 have double-digit price declines for single-family homes from their peaks in mid-2022 through June. The remaining 2 have declines of 9% from their peaks:

1. Austin, TX: -23%
2. Oakland, CA: -22%
3. New Orleans: -18%
4. San Francisco, CA: -16%
5. Birmingham, AL: -15%
6. Washington, DC: -12%
7. Fort Myers, FL: -10%
8. Denver, CO: -10%
9. Portland, OR: -9%
10. Phoenix, AZ: -9%

Month-over-month, single-family home prices declined in all of these cities in June, topped off by Oakland (-1.6%) and Fort Myers (-1.4%).

And year-over-year, prices declined in all 10 cities in June, topped off by Fort Myers (-9.2%) and Oakland (-8.9%).

But condo prices are well ahead on that slippery slope: The 19 Bigger Cities with the Biggest Price Declines of Condos (-12% to -24% from Peak through June)

These prices here are seasonally adjusted three-month moving averages of “mid-tier” single-family homes in “cities” (not in Metropolitan Statistical Areas, or metros, which are much larger). The values are from the Zillow Home Value Index (ZHVI), which is based on millions of data points in Zillow’s “Database of All Homes,” including from public records (tax data), MLS, brokerages, local Realtor Associations, real-estate agents, and households across the US. It includes pricing data for off-market deals and for-sale-by-owner deals. These are not median prices.

The 10 Bigger Cities with the biggest price declines.

The metrics in each table from left to right: price decline from the peak, month-over-month change (MoM), year-over-year change (YoY), and increase since January 2000.

Austin, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From Jun 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-23%	-0.9%	-6.4%	170%

Prices exploded by 64% in two years on the way up. But they’re taking their goodly time on the way down. They’re now back where they’d first been in May 2021, having undone in 36 months what they’d done in 14 months. Esay does it.

Oakland, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From May 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-22%	-1.6%	-8.9%	291%

Note the month-to-month plunge of 1.6%, which followed the 1.4% plunge in May (seasonally adjusted three-month average!). This is fast! Prices are back to February 2020.

In the decade between mid-2012 and the peak in May 2022, prices had exploded by 236%.

New Orleans, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From Jun 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2007
-18%	-0.2%	-4.0%	108%

Back to September 2020.

San Francisco, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From May 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-16%	-0.5%	-0.1%	234%

Prices are back to where they’d first been in May 2018. That was seven years ago.

Over the decade through mid-2022, prices exploded by 146%. But during the era of the price explosion from mid-2020 through mid-2022 in other markets, prices in San Francisco jumped “only” 14%, as some of the highly paid tech talent was leaving the city, and after prices had already shot up by 127% over the prior eight years to sky-high levels.

Birmingham, AL, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From Jul 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-15%	-0.4%	-5.3%	33%

Washington D.C., Single-Family Home Prices
From Jun 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-12%	-0.8%	-4.3%	276%

Back to August 2020.

Fort Myers, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From Apr 2024 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-10%	-1.4%	-9.2%	199%

Note the 9.2% year-over-year drop.

Denver, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From Jun 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-10%	-0.8%	-4.0%	215%

Back to December 2021. In the decade through mid-2022, prices had spiked by 174%.

Portland, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From May 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-9%	-0.5%	-0.8%	223%

Back to June 2021

Phoenix, City, Single-Family Home Prices
From Jul 2022 peak	MoM	YoY	Since 2000
-9%	-0.5%	-4.0%	252%

Prices exploded by 62% from April 2020 through July 2022, which was totally nuts, pushing the 10-year price increase through mid-2022 to 339%.

The kinds of price explosions documented in these charts that occurred through mid-2022 – and in similar charts of housing markets across the US – should never occur in housing markets. Homes are not cryptos. They’re a sign something went seriously awry.

And we know what went seriously awry: The Fed’s reckless monetary policies that repressed mortgage rates below 3% even as inflation was raging toward 9%. Borrowing at 3% while inflation is much higher is better than free money.

Or at least it seemed that way back then. And it proved irresistible, triggered a huge bout of FOMO, and the craziest home-buying behavior ever.

But that free-money era ended in 2022, when the Fed U-turned, hiked its short-term interest rates, and shed by now $2.3 trillion in securities via its QT program.

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