California leading country in loss of home values

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There are many indexes of the real estate market, and all of them, it would seem, are bad right now.

The latest report is from data provider First American CoreLogic, which said Wednesday that home price declines in the Los Angeles-Long Beach-Glendale metropolitan area were more than twice as steep as in the country at-large in December.

Home prices across the country declined 11.1% last month compared with a year ago, while Los Angeles-area home prices decreased 25.12%. Since July 2006, when U.S. home prices peaked, home prices have declined 19.3% on a cumulative basis nationwide and are currently back to the lowest price level since May 2004. The December decline represents 12 straight months of depreciation. The number of metropolitan markets experiencing price declines is, by far, the highest ever, the report said.

‘During 2008 homeowners lost a total of $2.4 trillion of their housing wealth, which will continue to put significant stress on consumer balance sheets, particularly as job losses continue to grow,’ said Mark Fleming, chief economist for First American CoreLogic. ‘The geographic breadth of price declines rapidly expanded in the second half of 2008, which means that housing wealth losses are broadening across much of the country.’

Nine of the 10 worst-performing markets were in California, however. These were the statistical areas of Stockton, -29.92%; Salinas, -29.83%; Modesto, -29.59%; Merced, -29.56%; Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, -29.53%; Vallejo-Fairfield, -29.49%; Bakersfield, -29.03%; Madera-Chowchilla, -28.44%; and El Centro, -28.05%. Florida’s greater Miami area also made the 10-worst list.

The area with greatest appreciation was Cedar Rapids, Iowa, with an improvement of almost 9%.

-- Roger Vincent