By Geoffrey Smith
Investing.com -- The U.S. housing market was firmly on a downward path by the end of summer, as selling prices fell for a third straight month in September, according to new data out on Tuesday.
S&P said its index of prices from 20 major metropolitican markets across the company fell another 1.5% in September, after having fallen 1.6% in August and 0.8% in July. August's drop was the biggest monthly fall in prices since the Great Financial Crisis in 2008, caused by the implosion of the subprime credit bubble.
In year-on-year terms, the rise in prices slowed to 10.4%, its lowest since the end of 2020, as the Federal Reserve's sequence of interest rate hikes has sharply reduced the amount of debt that most families can take on to finance a home purchase. Only five months ago, prices were still rising at an annual pace of over 20%.