SCOTTSDALE – Home prices in Scottsdale and the Northeast Valley are holding better than the overall market, which has plunged a record 21 percent in the past year.
That is according to the latest Arizona State University Repeat Sales Index, which tracks the sale of homes over time to gauge values. The report, released Thursday, tracked home prices over the past year ending in May.
The decline in prices varied widely:
• Scottsdale/Paradise Valley off 12 percent.
• Down 12.3 percent in the Northeast Valley communities of Carefree, Cave Creek, Fountain Hills, Paradise Valley and Scottsdale.
• Tempe, minus 14.7 percent.
• Chandler, minus 17.8 percent.
• Mesa, minus 21 percent.
• Peoria, minus 26.9 percent.
Prices have declined for 15 straight months, offsetting gains as high as 80.6 percent from 2004 to 2006.
“Houses are selling,” said Karl Guntermann, an ASU business professor who analyzes the data for the index with research associate Alex Horenstein. “There is enough demand to keep things from getting worse.”
A disturbing factor in the market is that an estimated 35 percent of home sales in July were foreclosure deals, suggesting that the declining prices will not ease up over the next few months, the professor said.
