Florida Real Estate Rebound Strongest in Nation

In a city-by-city comparison, Orlando leads the nation in both a month-to-month and year-to-year comparison, and only one non-Florida city makes the top five list for either time frame.

MCLEAN, Va. – September 28, 2015 – Freddie Mac's latest Multi-Indicator Market Index (MiMi) finds that the Florida real estate market's rebound leads the nation. In a city-by-city comparison, Orlando leads the nation in both a month-to-month and year-to-year comparison, and only one non-Florida city makes the top five list for either timeframe.

Florida comparisons

Month-over-month, Florida's index score rose 2.0 percent. It was followed by Colorado (+1.99%), New Jersey (+1.83%), Connecticut (+1.80%) and Nevada (+1.48%).

Year-over-year, Florida's index grew by 14.35 percent. It was followed by Oregon (+13.45%), Nevada (12.18%), Colorado (+11.65%), and Washington (+10.18%).

Florida metro comparisons

Orlando topped all city lists from Freddie Mac. Month-to-month, Orlando improved 2.6 percent, followed by Greenville, S.C. (+2.55%), Cape Coral (+2.51%), Tampa (+2.19%) and Jacksonville (+2.12%).

Year-to-year, Orlando improved 18.27 percent, followed by Cape Coral (+17.75%), Tampa (+15.99%), Palm Bay (+14.98%) and North Port (+14.77%).

"Florida has some of the most improving housing markets in the country, largely a reflection of more borrowers becoming current on their mortgage payments as the local employment picture improves and house prices rebound," says Freddie Mac Deputy Chief Economist Len Kiefer. "Nationally, all MiMi indicators are heading in the right direction for the second consecutive month and improving more than 6 percent from the same time last year."

U.S. numbers

Nationally, Freddie Mac added one more name to its list of slowly stabilizing markets: Rhode Island. It also added four cities: Philadelphia and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; Phoenix, Arizona; and Albany, New York.

The national MiMi value stands at 81, indicating a housing market that is on its outer range of stable housing activity. The number improved 0.93 percent month-to-month and 6.17 percent year-to-year. Since it's all-time low in October 2010, the MiMi has improved 37%.

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