Eye On Housing
Total Consumer Credit in May Decreases
The Federal Reserve’s latest G.19 Consumer Credit Report shows trends in consumer credit, excluding loans secured by real estate, through May 2020. In May, consumer credit decreased at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.3% from the previous month, with revolving debt1 decreasing by 28.6% and nonrevolving debt2 increasing by 2.3 percent. Consumer credit totaled $4.1 trillion on a seasonally… Read More ›
Recent Posts
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Initial and Continuing Jobless Claims Decline
Weekly initial jobless claims continued to decrease in the week ending July 4 and continuing claims, which lags initial jobless claims by one week, declined to about 18.1 million in the week ending June 20. The data indicate that the labor market is gradually recovering from the COVID-19 crisis as states reopen and workers return to work, albeit slowly. The… Read More ›
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Mortgage Purchasing Reaches Highest Level in over 10 Years
The Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) latest Weekly Application shows an uptick in applications for the week ending July 3, 2020. The Market Composite Index increased by 2.2% from the previous week on a seasonally adjusted basis and its constituent Purchasing and Refinancing indices increased by 5.3% and 0.4%, respectively. The MBA’s 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rate fell to a new record… Read More ›
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Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households (Part 2)
The Federal Reserve Board recently released its Report on the Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households. The report provided results from the responses to the 2019 Survey of Household Economics and Decision making (SHED) which was conducted before the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the responses to a smaller follow-up survey conducted in April 2020 to better understand the financial disruptions… Read More ›
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Construction Hiring Surged in May
After an accelerated pace of layoffs in March and April, construction sector hiring roared back in May, per data from the BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS). In May, the hiring rate increased to 9.6%, after a subdued 3.7% rate in April. This was the strongest rate of hiring in the history of the JOLTS data. The increase… Read More ›
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Treasury-Mortgage Spread Stays Constant in June
The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rate has been known to follow, albeit loosely, the 10-year Treasury yield. The latter is a widely tracked economic indicator and serves not only as a sign for the pulse of the U.S. economy, but also as a premium for pricing myriad financial instruments, upon which characteristics specific to the financial instrument are added. As 10-year… Read More ›
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U.S. Added 4.8 Million Jobs in June
In June, total payroll employment rose by 4.8 million and the unemployment rate dropped to 11.1%. The June data indicate that labor market is recovering from the COVID-19 crisis, though the road to a full recovery may be long. Residential construction employment rose by 83,200 in June to 2.8 million. Total construction industry (both residential and nonresidential) employment rebounded to… Read More ›
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Initial Jobless Claims Continue to Decline
While weekly initial jobless claims decreased for the 13th straight week, continuing claims, which lags initial jobless claims by one week, rose by 59,000 in the week ending June 20. The labor market is gradually recovering from the COVID-19 crisis as workers return to work, albeit slowly, and a full recovery of labor market may take a while with an… Read More ›
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Private Residential Spending Declined in May; Significant Revisions for Improvement Spending
NAHB analysis of the Census Construction Spending data shows total private residential construction spending stood at a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of $535.9 billion in May. It was down 4.0% in May, after a 5.1% decline in April, due to the economic consequences of the COVID-19 lockdowns. On a year-over-year basis, however, total private construction spending inched up 0.7%…. Read More ›
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Correlation Between Low Housing Supply and Purchase Loan Size
Despite the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) tracked 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage rate moving further downward, by one basis point from the previous week to a new record low of 3.29%, mortgage activity slowed, per the latest Weekly Application Survey. The Market Composite Index, representing purchasing and refinancing activities, decreased by 1.8% on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier, with… Read More ›