Started from the bottom, Dallas home prices now on top

DALLAS – The Dallas area is one of only two major U.S. markets where home prices have surpassed pre-recession levels.

Prices of preowned homes in Dallas and the Denver area are now 4 percent greater than where they were in 2007 before the housing crash, according to Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller.

Dallas prices are 17 percent higher than they were during the worst of the recession in early 2009. The rest of the country is still down more than 20 percent in home prices.

Dallas-area home prices were up a record 8.5 percent in July from a year earlier. While not as large as in many markets, Dallas’ price increases are double historic averages.

“We are still going up by a much greater rate than our long-term norm,” said Dr. James Gaines, an economist with the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. “I don’t think 8 percent and 8.5 percent increases are sustainable for very long,” he said.

So far in 2013, median prices of preowned single-family homes are up 11 percent in North Texas, according to data from real estate agents.