The US housing market is back on track after home prices declined significantly during the economic recession. Data from the Case-Shiller index indicates that prices have risen by around 23 percent over the past two years.

Bob Johnson, Director of Economic Analysis at Morningstar, favours the Case-Shiller report because it compares home prices on an apples-to-apples basis. Other housing reports only generate the average sales price for a particular month based on data that incorporates a range of homes from both the high and low end of the spectrum.

The Case-Schiller report illustrates that home prices dropped sharply after the 2008 recession and remained low until 2012. Since then though, prices are up by around 23 percent with year-on-year figures reaching 13 percent. However, this growth rate is unsustainable according to Bob Johnson and already appears to have plateaued after a few months.

Home price rises will slow to around 5 percent, and although this is a significant drop from the current 13 percent growth rate, it represents a healthy and sustainable level of growth that can sustain the US housing market, according to Bob Johnson.