Just when you were ready to breathe a sigh of relief that the housing crisis had passed and the market was back to normal, Trulia, a mobile and online real-estate resource, has released a study saying that buoyed home prices are just a mirage.
The big, high-dollar real-estate markets in key cities are raising average prices for the rest of homeowners, and less than 35 percent of the country has reached their pre-recession value peak.
Many national indicators of home prices had indicated that we were doing well. But they use medians or averages, which show us that the housing market looks like it’s recovered.
I spoke with Ralph McLaughlin, chief economist with Trulia, and he says those medians and averages mask a lot of what’s going on with individual home prices.
When they broke it down further and looked at the values of individual houses, the story is a little different. And, there are winners and losers in that.
