Prices of residential properties continue to fall, albeit at a slower pace, at the end of the past year with the housing market gaining stability again.

Over the past year's fourth quarter, the national S&P/Case-Shiller home-price index fell by 2.5%, compared with the same period for the previous year, as has been confirmed in a report released on Tuesday. The marginal drop is a definite improvement compared to the recession period. For 2008's fourth-quarter, prices of homes declined by 18.2% compared to 2007.

"Overall, this report suggests that the recent positive momentum in the U. S. housing market is gaining further traction and underscores that home prices are continuing to stabilize. As such, we may only be a few months away before we see a monthly gain in national home prices", shared Millan Mulraine, a TD Securities analyst.

The month-on-month difference in home prices for a composite index of as many as 20 housing markets that S&P/Case-Shiller monitors revealed that prices of residential properties actually managed to rise by 0.3% in December as compared to the previous month.

"What worries me right now is the default rate on mortgages. It might go up because of a change in our sense of responsibility to pay mortgages. People are angry and upset", said Robert Shiller, the Yale University Economist who co-founded the index.