Data Analysis

Miami home prices rose 3.53 percent over the year in July 2026 while Tampa prices fell 0.73 percent, the widest gap between two same-state metros in the Case-Shiller report.

S&P Dow Jones Indices reported a 1.9 percent annual gain in its U.S. National Home Price Index for July 2026, up from 1.6 percent in June. Miami ranked fourth and Tampa sixteenth among the 19 metropolitan areas reported this month.

Miami home prices rose 3.53 percent over the year in July 2026 while Tampa prices fell 0.73 percent, according to the S&P Cotality Case-Shiller Home Price Indices published September 29, 2026. The U.S. National Home Price Index rose 1.9 percent over the same period, up from 1.6 percent in June. The 20-City Composite rose 2.5 percent and the 10-City Composite rose 3.4 percent. Miami and Tampa are the only two Florida markets in the Case-Shiller index, and in July they sat 4.26 percentage points apart.

That gap is the story. Florida's two indexed metros finished the month further from each other than any other pair of same-state markets in the report, a calculation Momentum Research made from the release's own table rather than one S&P published.

How much did Miami and Tampa home prices change in July 2026?

S&P Dow Jones Indices reported Miami at plus 3.53 percent over the twelve months ending July 2026 and Tampa at minus 0.73 percent over the same twelve months. Both figures are annual changes in the metro-level indices, not month-over-month readings, and both come from the metro table in the September 29 release.

Miami finished the month 1.06 percentage points above the 20-City Composite's 2.47 percent. Tampa finished 3.20 percentage points below it. Those two comparisons are Momentum Research's arithmetic on the published figures.

Six of the 19 metros reported carried negative annual changes in July: Dallas at minus 0.44 percent, Portland at minus 0.65 percent, Tampa at minus 0.73 percent, Denver at minus 1.09 percent, Las Vegas at minus 1.29 percent and Seattle at minus 1.57 percent.

Where do Miami and Tampa rank among the Case-Shiller metros?

Ranked by annual change, Miami placed fourth of the 19 metros reported and Tampa placed sixteenth. Chicago led at plus 6.86 percent, followed by New York at plus 5.78 percent and Cleveland at plus 4.22 percent.

Two cautions about those ranks, both of them arithmetic rather than interpretation. Miami's 3.53 percent sits 0.05 percentage points above San Francisco's 3.48 percent, so the difference between fourth place and fifth place is five hundredths of a point and carries no real meaning. At the other end, Tampa's minus 0.73 percent sits 0.08 percentage points below Portland's minus 0.65 percent, so sixteenth against fifteenth is equally close. What the table supports is that Miami was among the strongest metros and Tampa among the weakest. It does not support treating either rank as a precise position.

The same-state comparison is cleaner. California has three metros in the index, and its spread ran from San Francisco at plus 3.48 percent to Los Angeles at plus 1.24 percent, a range of 2.24 percentage points. Florida's two metros spanned 4.26 points. No other state has more than one metro in the 20-City Composite.

What did the national Case-Shiller index do in July 2026?

The U.S. National Home Price Index posted a 1.93 percent annual gain in July, against 1.6 percent in June. The 10-City Composite rose 3.39 percent against 3.0 percent, and the 20-City Composite rose 2.47 percent against 2.2 percent. All three accelerated from June.

One detail in the June comparison is worth flagging. S&P's August 25 release reported June's national annual gain as 1.5 percent. The September 29 release states June as 1.6 percent. Both numbers are S&P's own, published a month apart, and the difference is a routine revision rather than a correction the company announced. Momentum Research noticed it by comparing the two releases.

Why did the 20-City Composite fall month over month but rise when adjusted?

Before seasonal adjustment, the 20-City Composite slipped 0.01 percent from June to July. After seasonal adjustment, the same composite rose 0.32 percent. The National Index rose 0.12 percent unadjusted and 0.29 percent adjusted. The 10-City Composite rose 0.03 percent unadjusted and 0.40 percent adjusted.

July is normally a strong month for closings, so the adjustment removes an expected seasonal lift and the adjusted figures come out higher than the raw ones. Readers will see either number quoted depending on the outlet. Both are in the release, and the sign on the 20-City monthly change depends on which one is used.

What does the "real" decline in the S&P commentary mean?

Rebecca Kaufman, Associate Director of Commodities at S&P Dow Jones Indices, said in the release: "While home prices continued to decline in real terms in July 2026, marking the 14th consecutive month of real declines, slightly lower inflation and stronger nominal home price appreciation helped narrow the gap."

Real terms means adjusted for inflation. The indices themselves are nominal, so a nominal gain that trails the rate of inflation still leaves a house worth less in purchasing-power terms than it was a year earlier, which is what the commentary describes. The release does not print the inflation series behind that comparison, and it does not give the size of the real decline.

Why is Detroit missing from the July report?

The July release covers 19 metros rather than the usual 20. Detroit was not included, which the release attributes to delays in transaction recording. The 20-City Composite is still published under that name. Anyone comparing metro counts month to month should note the omission rather than assume a data error.

What does this mean for Florida buyers and sellers?

The two Florida metros in this index moved in opposite directions, so a statewide reading taken from either one alone would be wrong. Miami's annual gain ran above the national and 20-City figures. Tampa's annual change was negative while the national index rose. Anyone pricing a home in either metro is working in a different market from the other, and current conditions for each are tracked on the Miami market page and the Tampa market page. Statewide figures, which cover far more of Florida than these two metros, sit on the Florida housing tracker, and the full set of metro pages is at our market index.

Limitations

This article's figures come from S&P Dow Jones Indices' own press release for the July 2026 data, read twice on two separate distributions of that release, because S&P's own website did not publish the figures anywhere this desk could read them. The spglobal.com index announcement page and press.spglobal.com carried nothing newer than the June 2026 release at 9:30 a.m., 11:45 a.m. and 4:55 p.m. ET on September 29. S&P's own Case-Shiller composite page did carry the July 2026 data stamp and a September 29 publication date from the morning onward, but its tables render through JavaScript and showed no values on any of those three checks. FRED had not published the July observation either. Both reads of the release returned identical figures. Methodology statements quoted here are taken from S&P's July 28, 2026 release document, since the standing methodology text is the same month to month.

Rankings, the 4.26-point Florida spread, the California comparison, the gaps to the 20-City Composite and the near-ties at fourth and sixteenth place are Momentum Research's calculations from the published table, not figures S&P stated.

The release labels these metro indices "Miami" and "Tampa" without printing the county definitions behind them, so this article does not state what areas they cover. S&P describes the National index as tracking the value of single-family housing and says each index combines matched price pairs for thousands of individual houses from arms-length sales, so this is a repeat-sales single-family measure. The release does not list what property types it leaves out, and this article does not guess. The July data was published on September 29, a two-month gap that the release does not explain. No claim is made here about whether Tampa's decline is the first, the largest or the longest of any run, because the desk has one month of metro data in hand and no series behind it.

Sources

S&P Dow Jones Indices, "S&P Cotality Case-Shiller Index Reports Annual Gain in July 2026," released September 29, 2026.

S&P Dow Jones Indices, "S&P Cotality Case-Shiller Index Reports Annual Gain in May 2026," release document dated July 28, 2026, for methodology and index base.

S&P Dow Jones Indices, "S&P Cotality Case-Shiller Index Reports Annual Gain in June 2026," released August 25, 2026, for the June national figure as first published.

Disclosure: Jon Brooks is a co-founder of Momentum Realty, a Florida real estate brokerage that owns and funds Florida Housing Intelligence. Momentum has a financial interest in Florida real estate transactions, including in markets named here. See our editorial standards.