South Florida home price growth continues to fall in March: report

2008 photo of Miami's skyline (Credit: Wyn Van Devanter)
2008 photo of Miami's skyline (Credit: Wyn Van Devanter)

Once the nation’s poster region for exploding home prices, the growth of South Florida’s property price has started to downshift.

That trend has continued through March, according to the newly released S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices.

Home prices in the tri-county area rose by 6.2 percent year-over-year, according to the report, and by 1.1 percent between February and March.

Of the 20 metropolitan areas included in the report, South Florida ranked ninth for rising property values. That’s a far-cry from the region’s days of double-digit price growth during the boom years of 2013 and 2014, and other metropolitan areas are now taking the lead.

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Portland home prices jumped the most in March with a 12.3 percent spike in value, followed by Seattle with 10.8 percent and Denver with 10 percent. South Florida was actually locked in a three-way tie for ninth place along with San Diego and Detroit.

A slower pace for home price growth is yet another sign that South Florida’s residential real estate market is taking a breather from what many market observers called an unsustainable boom.

Recent reports from research firms and brokerages have showed home sales in the region have taken a big hit in recent months amid growing inventory, both of which factor into determining a home’s value.

The slowdown can in part be explained by South Florida’s reliance on foreign buyers, whose economies have recently been in upheaval. — Sean Stewart-Muniz