US housing—potentially the key to help the lumbering US economy gain steam—continues to improve, as we noted yesterday. Notable leaps marked cities like Phoenix (17.0%), San Francisco (20.4%), Detroit (19.7%) and Minneapolis up (16.5%). The headline 20-city index was up 1.6% over June 2012, all 20 cities recorded monthly gains. Here’s the latest snapshot from S&P/Case-Shiller: