The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) has released its U.S. House Price Index (HPI) for April. Here is the opening of the press release:

​Washington, D.C. – House prices rose nationwide in April, up 1.6 percent from the previous month, according to the latest Federal Housing Finance Agency House Price Index (FHFA HPI®). House prices rose 18.8 percent from April 2021 to April 2022. The previously reported 1.5 percent price change for March 2022 was revised upward to 1.6 percent.

For the nine census divisions, seasonally adjusted monthly house price changes from March 2022 to April 2022 ranged from +0.3 percent in the East South Central division to +2.5 percent in the West South Central division. The 12-month changes were all positive, ranging from +14.1 percent in the Middle Atlantic division to +23.5 percent in the South Atlantic division.

"House price appreciation continues to remain elevated in April," said Will Doerner, Ph.D., Supervisory Economist in FHFA's Division of Research and Statistics. "The inventory of homes on the market remains low, which has continued to keep upward pressure on sales prices. Increasing mortgage rates have yet to offset demand enough to deter the strong price gains happening across the country."

The chart below illustrates the monthly HPI series, which is not adjusted for inflation, along with a real (inflation-adjusted) series using the Consumer Price Index: All Items Less Shelter.

In the chart above we see that the nominal HPI index has exceeded its pre-recession peak of what's generally regarded to have been a housing bubble. Adjusted for inflation, the index is now at 193.5, at its all-time high.

The next chart shows the growth of the nominal and real index since the turn of the century.

For an interesting comparison, let's overlay the HPI and the most closely matching subcomponent of the Consumer Price Index, Owners' Equivalent Rent of Residences (OER). Note: For an explanation of OER, see this PDF commentary from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

HPI and OER moved in close parallel from the 1991 inception date of the former until early 1999 when the two parted company and HPI began accelerating into the housing bubble. HPI then fell 20.7% over the next 48 months to its March 2007 trough. Confirmation of the "bubble" designation for house prices is the 39.4% spread between HPI and OER in January 2006.

Are we in another housing bubble? The current spread is 63.2%, exceeding the "bubble designation" just mentioned.

Here we compare the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers to both the Nominal and Real House Price Index, which is a similar comparison to what we do in our Case-Shiller update. Nominal HPI growth has clearly taken off since 2012. However, when adjusted for inflation, the House Price Index has not seen a dramatic increase since the late 1990s.