Home prices edge higher

The Case-Shiller numbers for October show the L.A. area with a 0.3 percent increase in prices from the previous month and a 6.3 percent decline from a year earlier. Both figures were better than most of the cities on the index. October month-to-month prices fell in places like Tampa, Atlanta and Chicago. From the S&P release:

"The turn-around in home prices seen in the Spring and Summer has faded with only seven of the 20 cities seeing month-to-month gains, although all 20 continue to show improvements on a year-over-year basis. All in all, this report should be described as flat." says David M. Blitzer, Chairman of the Index Committee at Standard & Poor's.

Blitzer says the data is likely to spark worries that home prices are about to take a second dip. But as with everything in the housing market, there are a bunch of cross-currents at play.

Sales of existing homes - those included in the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices - have been very strong in recent months, working off the inventories of houses for sale. At the same time, housing starts remain weak, fears that the market will be swamped by a wave of foreclosures are heard and government programs aimed at the housing market will expire in the first half of 2010.

Actual foreclosures have been easing - in California and elsewhere - but much of that is because the filing process has gotten bogged down by government rules that require lenders to make every effort at loan modification. Once those efforts have been exhausted, it's quite possible that the numbers will start increasing - to what degree no one knows. Here's the AP story on the Case-Shiller report.