House prices increases moderated slightly compared to the pace set in August, but the Federal Housing Finance Index (FHFA) said the month-over-month gain in its Housing Price Index (HPI) in September was still a robust 0.6 percent.  The index had posted 0.7 percent growth in August and a year-over-year gain of 6.4 percent.  The September 2015 to September 2016 change was 6.1 percent.

The change in the HPI from the second quarter of 2016 to the third quarter was 1.5 percent.  Over the year ending with Q3 home prices were up 6.1 percent, however, FHFA points out that prices of other goods and services over that period were virtually unchanged.  The means the price of homes reflects an inflation-adjusted gain of approximately 6.0 percent.

"Our data indicate that the deceleration in home price growth that we observed in late spring proved to be short-lived," said FHFA Supervisory Economist Andrew Leventis.  "While price growth in select markets has cooled somewhat, for the U.S. as a whole, the third quarter showed no evidence of a widespread slowdown."

The September number came in near analysts' expectations.  Those polled by Econoday were looking in a range of 0.4 to 0.9 percent with most expecting a repeat of the August increase of 0.7 percent.

The pace of appreciation was nearly national in scope, with Delaware and the District of Columbia the only areas that did not see annual increases.  The greatest growth was in Florida, up 10.7 percent, followed by Oregon and Washington State, both at 10.4 percent, Colorado (10.0 percent, and Utah (9.5 percent.)

Of the nine census divisions, the South Atlantic division experienced the strongest increase in the third quarter, posting a 1.8 percent quarterly increase and a 7.1 percent increase since the third quarter of last year.  House price appreciation was weakest in the New England division, where prices rose 0.8 percent from the last quarter. New England also posted the only month-over-month loss, down 0.2 percent.