Home Prices Expected to Hit Bottom by 2013

The housing market may finally be nearing a bottom according to a recent Zillow survey.

The June 2012 survey shows experts predict home prices will decline only slightly in 2012 and begin to rebound in 2013.

In Dacula, home prices have fallen 0.6 percent in the past year to an average home sale price of $143,600 in May. That number is slightly higher than the March 1, 2012 low of $142,000.

The individual economists surveyed were “largely in agreement on the trajectory of home prices nationally, signaling that a true bottom may be imminent,” the survey reported.

There was, however, some bad news as well.

A majority of respondents expect the U.S. home ownership rate to fall below the current rate of 65.4 percent. One in five respondents believe the home ownership rate may fall as low as 63 percent. The lowest rate on record -- set in 1965 -- is 62.9 percent.

"It's good to start to see some convergence of expectations among economists, as it lends further support to the claim that a bottom is real," said Zillow Chief Economist Stan Humphries in a released statement. "However, the fact that more than half of respondents believe that the home ownership rate will fall lower should be a sobering reminder that significant challenges remain ahead for the housing market, from negative equity to millions of foreclosed homeowners who now have impaired credit, making a return to home ownership harder than it would be otherwise."

Though housing prices are expected to rebound, the pace of recovery will be slow experts warn.

"In June 2010, the average cumulative appreciation in U.S. home prices expected by our panel was 10.3 percent for the years 2012 through 2014. Now, two years later, the average prediction among our experts for the same period is just 3.5 percent," said Terry Loebs, founder of Pulsenomics in a press release.  "This translates into $1.25 trillion less housing wealth than expected nationally over the coming three years."