Home Prices, Good News | featured news

The struggling U.S. housing market is expected to fall a little further as it searches for a bottom, but home prices are seen ticking up modestly in 2012, according to a Reuters poll released on Friday.

New single-family home sales unexpectedly fell in June, but a sharp rise in prices and declining supply suggested the market for new houses was starting to stabilize, a government report showed on Tuesday.

Home prices in major U.S. cities have risen for the first time in eight months, boosted by an annual flurry of spring buyers.

Consumers felt better about the short-term outlook for the economy in April as expectations about the pace of inflation and concerns about the labor market eased.

The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller index shows a modest 1% gain over May figures, with prices in Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco increasing.

California's median home price rose 11% in February from a year earlier, while home sales in the state dipped for the second consecutive month.

While the 20-city home price index rose 0.3 percent from November to December, the index was off 3.1 percent from December a year ago.

Dow futures were up 30 points. The S&P Case-Shiller home-prices indexes showed U.S. home prices decreased at a slower annual rate in October, but prices were flat compared to September.

U.S. single-family home prices rose in May from April, the first monthly increase in nearly three years, suggesting prices may be stabilizing, according to Standard & Poor's/Case Shiller home price indexes on Tuesday.

Slower rate suggests some parts of the housing market could be stabilizing, index shows.