Filtered by Subscriptions: US Housing Use setting US Housing
The first quarter Case-Shiller figures provide further evidence that the slowdown in the pace of house price gains that we have been expecting is now in train. It’s not implausible that the year-on-year rate of price growth will fall from above 10% to …
27th May 2014
In April, new home sales reversed most of the previous month’s decline to stand just4% below the high seen in October last year. Alongside yesterday’s modest rise inexisting home sales, the data indicate that there is still life in the US housing …
23rd May 2014
Existing home sales registered their first rise in four months in April. And to the extent that a lack of stock has been holding back activity rates in recent months, the further rise in the number of homes on the market was another sign that the housing …
22nd May 2014
Last year’s rise in mortgage interest rates may have dented home sales and housing starts, but it has not dented the downward trend in the number of US households suffering mortgage payment problems. Accordingly, the delinquency data do little to support …
15th May 2014
Fed Chair Janet Yellen expressed worries about the resilience of the housing recovery in her testimony to Congress last week. But the recent sales and mortgage lending figures have been more encouraging. … Positive signs on home sales and mortgage …
12th May 2014
The rise in mortgage applications for home purchase in April, alongside the recent pick-up in the Fed’s measure of the value of residential mortgage lending, are encouraging signs that mortgage lending is increasing. Admittedly, none of this changes the …
7th May 2014
House price gains have held steady at 11%-12% y/y for a year now. But the tight supply conditions which have driven these gains are now loosening, pointing to a moderation in price rises before too long. … CoreLogic House Prices …
6th May 2014
The increase in the share of households renting to a 19-year high in Q1, and the low supply of homes entering the rental market, look like boons for both rental value growth and multi-family homebuilding. … Homeownership & Vacancy Rates & Case-Shiller …
29th April 2014
It is too early to take the weakening in activity as evidence that the housing recovery is over. The soft numbers could plausibly be the result of the temporary slowdown in job growth, the recent severe weather or even simple measurement error. If so, …
24th April 2014
The plunge in new home sales in March raises difficult questions about the sustainability of the housing recovery. But with other parts of the economy starting to shrug off the winter malaise, we are not sounding the alarm bells just yet. … New Home …
23rd April 2014
The latest small decline in existing home sales cannot easily be passed off as weather-related weakness, as those regions which suffered most from the severe weather saw sales bounce back in March. But at least the composition of existing home sales is …
22nd April 2014
The below-expectations increase in housing starts in March, which made up for only one-fifth of earlier weather-related falls, suggests that the shortage of labour and lots is constraining the improvement in homebuilding that the fundamentals would seem …
16th April 2014
The unprecedented negative spread between jumbo and conforming mortgage interest rates did not last for long. But the normalisation of the gap between jumbo and conforming rates marks an important stage in the return of private capital to the mortgage …
11th April 2014
The recent housing market activity data have been weak more or less across the board, with new and existing homes sales, as well as housing starts, all declining in February. These falls were largely the result of the recent severe weather, as well as the …
10th April 2014
The slight increase in mortgage applications for home purchase in March was a step in the right direction. But mortgage demand will have to rise much more strongly than this if mortgage-dependent buyers are going to play a larger role in the housing …
2nd April 2014
The CoreLogic measure reported that house prices continued to rise rapidly in February. However, the recent loosening in supply conditions suggests that runaway house price inflation will not continue for too much longer. … CoreLogic House Prices …
1st April 2014
The housing recovery is at a crossroad. We expect looser supply conditions to drive a moderation in house price gains over the next year. But our forecasts assume that declining investor demand will be replaced by mortgage-dependent buyers. If …
27th March 2014
The rapid, double-digit increases in house prices are unlikely to continue now that housing market supply conditions are loosening. … Case-Shiller Prices & New Home Sales …
25th March 2014
The slight decline in existing home sales in February was the sixth drop in seven months. However, sales of non-distressed existing homes are doing much better. … Existing Home Sales …
20th March 2014
Continued unseasonably severe weather, as well as a shortage of lots, kept housing starts subdued in February. But the size of the shortfall between starts and household formation means that construction won’t stay this low for long. … Housing Starts …
18th March 2014
The biggest risk facing the US housing market is that higher mortgage interest rates and tight credit conditions prevent a recovery in mortgage demand, meaning that mortgage-dependent buyers do not take the place of retreating investors. … What is the …
13th March 2014
New home sales shook off earlier weather effects to post a strong gain in January. Although existing home sales fell again, they should also recover before too long. Nevertheless, the bigger picture is that the recent weakness of housing market demand, …
11th March 2014
The drop in mortgage applications for home purchase in February, which could be related to the introduction of new mortgage lending rules during the previous month, mean that applications are at rock-bottom levels. … Mortgage Applications (Feb. …
5th March 2014
The first CoreLogic house price reading of 2014 suggests that prices started the year on a strong note. But this figure reflects supply and demand conditions from several months ago. The recent weakening in sales activity points to a slowdown in price …
4th March 2014
The strong rise in new home sales in January means that the recovery in housing market activity looks to be back on track. There is considerable scope for new home sales to rise further in 2014. … New Home Sales (Jan …
26th February 2014
House prices rose by a strong 11.4% during 2013 as a whole. However, prices are a lagging indicator of the health of the housing market. The more recent weakness of home sales will weigh on price growth before too long. … Case-Shiller Home Prices …
25th February 2014
Among the recent weather-hit housing market activity data, the further improvement in the mortgage delinquency and foreclosure picture is a timely reminder that the fundamentals of the housing market are still on the mend. … Mortgage Delinquencies (Q4 …
20th February 2014
The sharp fall in housing starts in January looks like further payback following November’s surge, combined with weather-related disruption. So while 2014 has got off to an unpromising beginning, we think that this year will be a strong one for housing …
19th February 2014
Mortgage demand is struggling to shake off the impact of last year’s jump in mortgage interest rates. But providing that the wider economic and labour market recovery remain on track, we see no reason why demand will not pick up as the year progresses. …
14th February 2014
The recovery in housing market activity has taken a knock. Existing home sales edged up in December, but the pending home sales index recorded a worrying slump. New home sales fell substantially in December, and while mortgage applications for home …
13th February 2014
The rise in mortgage applications for home purchase in January means that applications have repeated the pattern of falling in one month and rising in the next for six months now. The outlook for home purchase applications is highly uncertain, but on …
5th February 2014
The growing take up of adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) does not look like a long-term threat to the stability of the housing market. Even after recent gains, the size of the ARM market is small. And the majority of new ARMs have initial fixed-rate …
4th February 2014
The final CoreLogic house price reading of 2013 showed that house prices rose by 11% last year. But the year-on-year rate of gains softened in the closing months of the year and is likely to weaken further in 2014. … CoreLogic House Prices …
The slight decline in the homeownership rate at the end of last year is a reminder that, even though the housing market is recovering, the share of the population who own their home probably has further to fall. … Homeownership and Vacancy Rates (Q4 …
31st January 2014
Monthly house price inflation has been in the 0.7%-1.2% range since mid-2013, and November was no exception. But the number of locations in the Case-Shiller 20-City index which are seeing a moderation in annual prices gains is increasing. … …
28th January 2014
The large decline in new home sales in December was probably driven by last month’s unseasonably severe winter weather. Sales activity in January is likely to be weak for similar reasons. But we continue to think that new home sales will stage an …
27th January 2014
The subdued level of homebuilding in Nevada, Arizona, California and Florida is primarily a legacy of the glut of cheap, distressed homes which flooded the market during the recession and crowded out homebuilders. Now that this inventory is being worked …
24th January 2014
It’s too early to conclude that the small increase in existing home sales in December marks the end of the weaker period for sales. But the rise looks consistent with a fading of the negative impact of last year’s hike in mortgage interest rates. … …
23rd January 2014
The drop in housing starts in December was more or less in line with expectations and is explained by the surge in housing starts in the previous month and the winter storms in December. We continue to think that the outlook for housing starts in 2014 is …
17th January 2014
The slump in existing home sales has set the recovery in housing market activity back by 12 months. But there are good reasons to think that, like the timelier new home sales series, the decline in existing home sales will prove temporary. … Will …
15th January 2014
The strong 22.7% m/m increase in housing starts in November was an encouraging sign that the rise in mortgage interest rates is not a permanent setback for the homebuilding recovery. This gain echoed the earlier rally in new home sales, which recovered …
10th January 2014
The drop in mortgage applications in December reflects the increase in mortgage interest rates over the past two months. But if the wider economy continues to pick up speed during 2014 as we expect, then mortgage applications should recover. … …
8th January 2014
It’s too early to tell if the marginal dip in the annual pace of house price inflation in November marks the start of the slowdown in price gains that we are expecting. But we are confident that annual price gains will not remain in double-digit territory …
7th January 2014
The further decline in existing home sales to 4.90 million annualised in November, from 5.12 million the month before, reflects the continuing impact of the marked rise in mortgage rates earlier this year. We anticipate a recovery in sales next year, but …
19th December 2013
The strong rise in housing starts in November is an encouraging sign that homebuilders have not been overly spooked by higher mortgage interest rates. And with starts still below the level needed simply to satisfy household formation, there is still …
18th December 2013
The sharp 25.4% m/m increase in new home sales in October reversed the decline during the previous three months and left new home sales back at their level before mortgage interest rates rose. That's an encouraging sign that the hit from higher mortgage …
12th December 2013
The housing market recovery is entering a new phase. The rapid bounce in house prices, which was driven by strong investment buying and tight supply conditions, will soon start to moderate. The recovery will then be characterised by strengthening activity …
11th December 2013
New home sales were still suffering the effects of the rise in mortgage interest rates in September, but fully made up for their earlier weakness in October. In other words, higher rates do not appear to have done lasting damage to the housing recovery. …
4th December 2013
The slight rise in mortgage applications for home purchase in November was not enough to undo earlier falls. But it was a step in the right direction and we expect mortgage activity to pick up modestly over the next year. … Mortgage Applications (Nov …
With the release of the CoreLogic house price index for October it’s clear that the pace of monthly house price gains has accelerated in recent months. But we continue to expect price gains to slow significantly over the next year. … CoreLogic House …
3rd December 2013
