Also this week, CoreLogic said U.S. home prices were up 7.4% in November year-over-year. It was the largest annual increase since May 2006.
The recovery is helping homeowners who were underwater on their mortgages. The housing bust resulted in 12 million borrowers in the U.S. who owed more on their mortgages than their houses were worth, blocking them from moving or saving money by taking advantage of the lowest borrowing costs on record to refinance, Bloomberg News reports.
“It supports household wealth, consumer confidence and can generate greater credit creation,” Bank of America senior economist Michelle Meyer said in the report. “If prices are rising, homeowners believe that they will once again have an appreciating asset. It’s a very big change in how they think about their wealth and their balance sheets.”
iShares DJ US Home Construction
