Have Housing Prices Hit Bottom at Last?

According to a report released last week by Bank of America and Merrill Lynch, housing prices are finally hitting bottom.

Just last November, Merrill Lynch analysts had forecast that housing prices would drop another 8% from the second quarter of 2011 through the first quarter of 2013. The revised forecast is credited to reduced inventory and reduced numbers of distresed properties coming available.

Not that home prices are expected to rebound any time soon. Even so, flat prices or a tiny gain would be welcome after seeing prices continue to fall year after year, which is what we have seen nationally every year since 2006.

The Triangle was one of the last to be affected by the meltdown in the housing market; we can expect it to be one of the first to recover. Have home prices bottomed out here? The next few months will tell the tale.