Twin Cities home prices up in April

A housing index shows that Twin Cities home prices logged gains in April.

According to the Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller Index,

Area home prices climbed nearly 4 percent over April last year. That was the third-consecutive month for annual price gains in the Twin Cities.

Such improvement is an encouraging sign for the local housing market, Augsburg College economist Jeanne Boeh said.

"My takeaway is that we're approaching the bottom, if we're not there already," she said.

S&P economist David Blitzer was more tentative in identifying a bottom to the market. But he noted that local prices in April performed better than most major metro areas in the broader 20-city index, year over year.