When looking at the housing market and home prices nationally and locally, it is difficult to compare apples to apples, said Stan Longhofer, director of the Center for Real Estate at Wichita State University.
 Home prices shot up in America’s largest cities in May, rising at a pace not seen since the bubble days, according to the Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller index of 20 large U.S. cities report released Tuesday. These prices rose 2.4 percent from April and 12.2 percent from May 2012 - the largest year-over-year gain since March 2006.
But, Longhofer said, one has to look beyond the numbers to make sense of them.
“In the smaller markets, you will see greater year-to-year variability,” he said. When there are fewer homes changing hands, small changes can make a big difference.
Besides, he said, due to strong oil and agricultures sectors, western Kansas never saw the wild swings experiences elsewhere. 
The Case-Shiller index considers such a large amount of data that it can make adjustments to compensate for such market variables. But, when looking just at Great Bend, there is no good way to do this.

The big picture
 Average home prices across the 20 cities have now reached their spring 2004 level. For the first time, two cities - Denver and Dallas - surpassed the peaks they reached before the 2008 financial crisis. All cities tracked by the index saw prices rise from a year earlier and the previous month.
In Kansas, according to the, Federal Housing Finance Agency May index, single-family housing prices have mirrored this trend. However, prices in the Sunflower State never zig-zagged at the levels seen nationally or in the larger markets.
In 2009, prices tumbled over 2 percent. The market regained that loss in 2010, but fell again early in 2011.
The prices climbed and actually gained a percentage point in 2012, a year that ended with another decline, albeit a moderate one. They are now on the rebound.
When the major metropolitan areas of the state are removed from the equation, the FHFA reported even a more stable market. Although rural Kansas experienced fluctuations, they weren’t nearly as volatile as the populations centers or the rest of the country.
“Rural areas have been doing better than the United States and Kansas as whole,” Longhofer said. There are variations from region to region.

Closer to home
According to a report compiled by Longhofer and the center for the Great Bend Board of Realtors, total home sales in the Great Bend area fell last month to 26 units, compared to 31 units in June 2012, for a drop of 16.1 percent. Total sales volume was $2.8 million, down from a year earlier.
The median sale price in June was $103,150, up from $73,000 a year earlier. The median list price of homes on the market at the end of June was $85,000.
Homes that sold in June were typically on the market for 23 days and sold for 95.5 percent of their list prices.
The total number of active listings in the Great Bend area at the end of June was 75 units, down from 106 at the same point in 2012. This represents a 2.9 months’ supply of homes available for sale.
During June, a total of 20 contracts were written down from 37 in June 2012. At the end of the month, there were 30 contracts pending, compared to 48 at the end of June 2012.
Because of the potential variables, he said looking at the year-to-date sales may be a more accurate read on the local market that year-to-year.
For the first the first six months of 2013, the median home price was $75,000, up 9.9 percent from $68,250 for the same period in 2012. The 2012 price was down 6.5 percent from 2011.
The time homes remain for sale has continued downward over the three years, and are bring a higher percentage of the asking price.
“These are signs of a stable market,” Longhofer said.
Prices are consistent and inventory is low from last year and prices haven’t risen with demand, but they are more solid than last year. The low inventory and low interest rate have caused a lot of the demand in this area.

Few homes for sale
However, the result of this has been fewer homes for sale, Longhofer said. “Across Kansas, home inventories have been slimming down for a couple of years. Sales are up and (new) listings are not keeping pace.”
This is seen nationally as well.
Low mortgage rates, a shortage of homes for sale and heavy investor demand have sent home prices sharply higher this year, providing an economic boost but also causing concerns that some markets are growing to fast.
Las Vegas and Phoenix, two cities where prices fell hard during the bust, have come roaring back, in large part because investors have scooped up many foreclosed properties to flip or rent out. Year-over-year prices rose 23.3 percent in Las Vegas and 20.6 percent in Phoenix. Those gains were surpassed only by the San Francisco market, a tech mecca where prices jumped 24.5 percent from May 2012.
Southern California price increases maintained their rapid pace in May. Prices in the Los Angeles region rose 19.2 percent over the year and 17.3 percent in the San Diego area.
New York, Cleveland and Washington, D.C., posted the slowest year-over-year increases in May: 3.3 percent, 3.4 percent and 6.5 percent, respectively.
The Case-Shiller index compares home values by comparing the recent sales of detached houses with past sales of those same homes, taking into account factors such as remodeling that might affect a home’s price. Created by economists Karl E. Case and Robert J. Shiller, the gauge is the most widely followed home price measure.