Black Knight Mortgage Monitor: "Record-Setting Slowdown in Home Price Growth"

"Largest Monthly Inventory Gain in 12 Years"

Black Knight publishes a monthly Mortgage Monitor report that contains interesting information on the mortgage market and housing.

Press Release: Black Knight: June Sees Record-Setting Slowdown in Home Price Growth, Largest Monthly Inventory Gain in 12 Years; Prices Back Off Highs in Some Major Markets

Today, the Data & Analytics division of Black Knight, Inc. released its latest Mortgage Monitor Report, based upon the company's industry-leading mortgage, real estate and public records datasets. With June marking the greatest deceleration in home price growth on record, this month’s report dives deep into the latest housing market trends, looking specifically into home price appreciation and for-sale inventory trends at both the national and metro levels. According to Black Knight Data & Analytics President Ben Graboske, June’s slowdown in home price growth coincided with the largest single-month gain in homes listed for sale in 12 years.

The pullback in home price growth in June marked the strongest single month of slowing on record dating back to at least the early 1970s – and it wasn’t even close,” said Graboske. “According to the Black Knight HPI, the annual rate of appreciation dropped nearly two full points in June. For context, during the 2006 downturn the strongest single-month slowing was 1.19% – about what we saw last month – and June topped that by 66%. The slowdown was broad-based among the top 50 markets at the metro level, with some areas experiencing even more pronounced cooling. …

“We’re also seeing significant shifts in the demand-supply equation, though that too has quite a way to go before normalization. Even with our Collateral Analytics data showing a seasonally adjusted 22% increase in the number of homes listed for sale over the past two months, the market is still at a 54% listing deficit when compared to 2017-2019 levels.”
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House Price Growth was Strong in June, but Slowing Quickly

The first graph shows Black Knight’s estimate of monthly house price increases and the year-over-year change in prices.

• The annual home price growth rate fell by nearly two full percentage points to 17.3% in June, from 19.3% in the prior month – a 66% stronger deceleration than in the prior month

• June's slowdown surpassed by 50% the 134 BPS plunge precipitated by Volcker-era rate hikes in the early 1980s and was the most significant drop since at least the early 1970s

• Even after hitting the brakes historically in June, it would take six more months of equivalent slowing to bring the annual growth rate down to 5%, more in line with the long-term average

Mortgage Delinquencies at Record Lows

Here is a graph on delinquencies from Black Knight. Overall delinquencies are near record lows.

• The national delinquency rate rose to 2.84% in April, up 9 BPS, but still below the long-run average

• Both long- and short-term delinquency rates increased in June, with a 5% increase in the number of borrowers a single payment past due, and 90-day delinquencies edging up 1% after 21 consecutive months of improvement

Inventory of Homes Listed for Sale

June saw the largest increase in the number of existing homes listed for sale in more than 12 years as inventory pressures begin to slowly improve across the country

• Our Collateral Analytics dataset suggests the number of homes listed for sale has now risen by 114K (+22%) on a seasonally adjusted basis over the past two months

• Likewise, a Black Knight analysis of Realtor.com data suggests that the shortage of for sale inventory has fallen by 103K when compared to same month 2017-2019 averages

• While rising inventory is a welcome sight, the number of homes for sale still remains 54% below 2017-2019 levels nationally, a deficit of 716K

• Even with the strongest level of growth in more than a decade, it would take more than a year at this rate for inventory levels to fully normalize

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There is much more in the mortgage monitor. For example, Black Knight also has data on the status of mortgage loans that were in forbearance - and also data on house prices to median income (at all time high).