Data through March 2008, released today by Standard & Poor’s for its S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices, the leading measure of U.S. home prices, shows continued broad based declines in the prices of existing single family homes across the United States, a trend that prevailed throughout 2007 and has continued into the first quarter of 2008.

The chart above depicts the annual returns of the U.S. National Home Price, the 10-City Composite and the 20-City Composite Indices. The decline in the S&P/Case-Shiller U.S. National Home Price Index – which covers all nine U.S. census divisions – reached well into double digits, recording a 14.1% decline in the 1st quarter of 2008 versus the 1st quarter of 2007, the largest in the series 20-year history. As a comparison, during the 1990-91 housing recession the annual rate bottomed at -2.8%. The 10-City and 20-City Composites also set new records, with annual declines of -15.3% and -14.4%, respectively.