The housing market is showing signs of a rebound - and home prices are climbing in these 3 cities the most

• S&P CoreLogic's national home price index climbed in April from the prior month, marking three straight gains.
• Miami, Chicago, and Atlanta saw the steepest annual price gains in March, data showed Tuesday.
• "If I were trying to make a case that the decline in home prices that began in June 2022 had definitively ended in January 2023, April's data would bolster my argument."

The housing market is showing more signs of a rebound, with home prices climbing for three consecutive months.

The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller national home price index was up 1.3% in April from the prior month before seasonal adjustments and up 0.5% after adjustments.

On an annual basis, prices were down 0.2%, but the monthly trend suggests that prices are stabilizing. All 20 major metro markets reported month-over-month price increases, with gains accelerating in 12 of those.

"If I were trying to make a case that the decline in home prices that began in June 2022 had definitively ended in January 2023, April's data would bolster my argument," Craig J. Lazzara, managing director at S&P DJI, said in a statement. "Whether we see further support for that view in coming months will depend on how well the market navigates the challenges posed by current mortgage rates and the continuing possibility of economic weakness."

But the housing market remains highly divided regionally. For example, the Southeast saw prices rise 3.6%, while the West saw prices drop 6.9%.

Among cities, Miami saw the highest gain, the report said, with home prices increasing 5.2% year over year. Chicago held the second spot, with a 4.1% increase. Atlanta saw the third-highest annual home price increase, at 3.5%.

The lowest eight performers as far as price growth, according to the data, were all cities in the Mountain or Pacific time zones. Seattle and San Francisco were at the bottom, with price declines of 12.4% and 11.1%, respectively.

"The ongoing recovery in home prices is broadly based," Lazzara said. "Before seasonal adjustments, prices rose in all 20 cities in April (as they had also done in March). Seasonally adjusted data showed rising prices in 19 cities in April (versus 14 in March)."

Meanwhile, the positive signs in the Case-Shiller report contrast with Realtor.com's recent downgrade to its housing market forecast for this year.

The group now expects average home list prices to drop 0.6% from last year. Before, it predicted a 5.4% annual rise for 2023.

"Home costs are still going to be higher for buyers in 2023 because home price declines are very mild and not universal," Realtor.com chief economist Danielle Hale said. "Some areas are still seeing home prices going up and mortgage rates are still very high."