Home values nationwide rose for the 16th straight month in February

Metropolitan Areas	Feb. 2013 Zillow home Value Index	Month-Month % Change	Year-Year % Change
Dallas-Fort Worth	$133,100	0.8%	6.9%

Home values nationwide rose for the 16th straight month in February to a Zillow® Home Value Index[i] of $158,100, and all 30 of the largest metro areas covered by Zillow registered both monthly and annual appreciation as the housing market recovery became more widespread in advance of the traditional spring home shopping season, according to the February Zillow Real Estate Market Reports

U.S. home values rose 0.1 percent in February compared with January and were up 5.8 percent year-over-year. The 5.8 percent annual gain is the second-largest since August 2006, exceeded only by January's 6 percent year-over-year jump. The last time national home values were at this level was in June 2004.

For the 12-month period from February 2013 through February 2014, U.S. home values are expected to rise 3.2 percent to approximately $163,100, according to the Zillow Home Value Forecast[iii]. This rate is well below the 5.6 percent annual rate of appreciation recorded in 2012, and is in line with Zillow's expectations that home value appreciation will slow to closer to historic norms of between 3 percent and 5 percent in coming years.

"The housing market recovery has continued to gain momentum over the past several months and looks firmly entrenched as we enter the 2013 spring home shopping season," said Zillow Chief Economist Dr. Stan Humphries. "We expect that rising home values will continue to help cure many of the ills still facing the housing market, including high levels of negative equity. Rising home values will free many more homeowners from negative equity, allowing some of them to list their homes for sale which, in turn, will ease supply constraints. Burgeoning new construction will also help bring more supply into the marketplace. As more supply comes on line, home value appreciation rates will moderate and stabilize, marking the final transition from a recovering market to a healthy and sustainable market."

Of the 30 largest metro areas covered by Zillow, markets where home values increased the most over February 2012 includedPhoenix (+22.9 percent), San Francisco (+18.6 percent), Las Vegas (+18.1 percent), San Jose (+17.1 percent) and Sacramento, Calif. (+15.3 percent). Only 73 of the 352 total metro markets covered by Zillow experienced year-over-year home value declines in February.

National rents rose slightly in February compared with January, up 0.1 percent to a Zillow Rent Index[iv] of $1,282. Year-over-year, national rents were up 4.5 percent in February.

The number of completed home foreclosures in February fell to 5.25 homes foreclosed out of every 10,000 homes nationwide, down 0.8 homes from January and 2.5 homes from February 2012. Foreclosure resales represented 13.71 percent of homes sold in February, up 1.2 percentage points from January but down 3.5 percentage points from February 2012.