Given mortgage costs, weak homebuyer demand, and the year’s rising supply of unsold homes, home prices should have receded.

While high grocery prices have remained a hot topic among consumers and politicians, the annual rate of food-at-home prices has held steady at about 1%.

Over the past 40 years, U.S. home prices as tracked by the Freddie Mac House Price Index, have soared a staggering 494%. The 10 states with the biggest home price gains between March 1984 and ...