As Home Prices Plummet, When Will You Buy?

Home prices in 20 of the nation's major metro areas in July were collectively down 16.3 percent from a year ago, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index released today. Prices in those metro areas were down 19.5 percent from their peak in July 2006.

"There are signs of a slow down in the rate of decline across the metro areas, but no evidence of a bottom," said David M. Blitzer, Chairman of the Index Committee at Standard & Poor's


"I think this time residential housing is in the 100-year flood, and I think it's going to take a long time to recover," said David Shulman, senior economist at the UCLA Anderson Forecast, at the Zelman & Associates Housing Summit in Dallas on Sept. 17.

Shulman said he expects home prices nationwide to go down 25 percent from peak to trough, although he acknowledged that prices could "overshoot to the downside." And while modest appreciation could resume in late 2009, prices won't be back to their 2006 peak until at least 2016, possibly as late as 2020 in some markets, according to Shulman