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Selma Hepp is the Chief Economist for CoreLogic, America’s largest provider of advanced property and ownership information, analytics and data-enabled services. Selma leads the economics team, which is responsible for analyzing, interpreting and forecasting housing and economic trends in real estate, mortgage and insurance.
Prior to joining CoreLogic in 2020, Selma was Chief Economist and Vice President of Business Intelligence for Pacific Union International, later acquired by Compass, where she oversaw the vital economic and technology intelligence to drive the expanding brokerage’s success. Selma also held the role of Chief Economist for Trulia; Senior Economist for the California Association of Realtors; and Economist and Manager for Public Policy and Homeownership research for the National Association of Realtors, as well as a special research assistant at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Selma frequently appears on local and national radio and television programs and has been widely quoted in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and many industry trade publications such as National Mortgage News and HousingWire. Selma received the HousingWire Women of Influence Award in 2022. She has served as president of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Association for Business Economics (NABE), NABE Real Estate Roundtable co-chair, Board member of the International Student Exchange Program, Advisory Board member of the REALTOR® University Research Center Editorial Review and a Member of the Housing Policy Debate Editorial Advisory Board. Selma held a Real Estate Associate professional license in Florida and Virginia.
Selma graduated from the State University of New York, Buffalo with an M.A. in Economics and holds a Ph.D. from the University of Maryland.
After a short respite, home price growth sped up in January. The S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Index registered a 19.2% increase after four months of slowing or flat growth. This was the strongest January year-over-year increase since the beginning of the data series.
Although home price gains are expected to slow in 2022 and average a little less than 10% growth for the year, the recent rapid acceleration in prices has led to overvaluations in some markets, therefore pushing up the risk of price decline in the year ahead.
After some signs of slowing home price growth, suggested by the seasonally adjusted deceleration in month-to-month gains, November monthly price growth re-accelerated again, indicating home buyers have not yet thrown in the towel.
In addition to elevated demand for owner-occupied and second homes since the onset of the pandemic, there has also been an increase in investor home purchases across the U.S. housing markets.
Despite some headwinds to the housing demand stemming from higher mortgage rates, affordability constraints and continued lack of supply, home price growth and home sales activity continued to track at record levels.
There were unexpected economic and financial twists in 2021, and the housing market experienced its fair share of surprises.
