FHFA: Rocky Mountain regional home prices up 11 percent

House prices in June in the Mountain region, which includes Colorado, were up substantially, rising 11.1 percent, year-over-year from June 2011 to June 2012. Nationally, the house price index rose 3.7 percent over the same period. The new house price index numbers, released this month by the Federal Housing and Finance Agency, also showed that the national index is down 15.3 percent from the peak level reached in June 2007, while the Mountain region's index is down 23.3 percent over the same period.

The FHFA monthly index is calculated using purchase prices of houses purchased with loans that have been sold to or guaranteed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. It is a repeat-sales index similar to the Case-Shiller index, but limited to GSE loans.

The second graph shows each month's house price index compared to the same month a year earlier:

June 2012 was the 5th month in a row during which the house price index rose year over year, following 52 months of year-over-year declines. 

This report is just the latest home price index showing accelerating growth in home prices in the US and regionally.