Eye On Housing
The Housing Trends Report (HTR) is a research product created by NAHB’s Economics team to track prospective home buyers’ perceptions about the availability and affordability of homes for-sale in their markets. Results are based on national polls conducted by Morning Consult, but are not seasonally adjusted due to the short time horizon of the series, and therefore caution is advised… Read More ›
Tag Archive for ‘housing’
New Home Sales Fall Back in June
Contracts for new, single-family home sales declined in June, falling 5.3% to a 631,000 seasonally adjusted annual rate according to estimates from the joint release of HUD and the Census Bureau. The decline came off a downwardly revised May estimate, which was dropped from an initial read of 689,000 to a new estimate of 666,000. The June estimate was the lowest annual pace since… Read More ›
14% of Adults Plan to Buy Home in Next 12 Months; Most for the First-Time
This post releases the second edition of the Housing Trends Report (HTR), a research product created by the NAHB Economics team with the goal of measuring prospective home buyers’ perceptions about the availability and affordability of homes for-sale in their markets. The HTR will be released quarterly in order to track changes in buyers’ perceptions over time. All data are… Read More ›
Residential Construction Down in June
Following two consecutive monthly increases, single-family starts fell by 9.1 percent over the month of June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 858,000, according to a joint release by the Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. However, over the quarter, starts of single-family houses was about flat, rising by 1.2 percent to 900,000. This is… Read More ›
Builder Confidence Stays at Healthy Level in July
Builder confidence in the market for newly-built single-family homes remained unchanged at a solid 68 reading in July on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI). Builders are optimistic about housing market conditions, basing their confidence on continued solid demand for single-family homes. However, persistent increases in construction costs make it increasingly challenging to produce homes… Read More ›
Slightly Longer Hours Worked Makes Up For Faster Inflation
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported that, on a seasonally adjusted basis, headline consumer prices, grew over the month of June, but at a slower pace than in May. The monthly slowdown partly reflected a decline in energy prices, electricity and utility (piped) gas specifically, although food prices accelerated over the month. Excluding energy and food prices, “core” inflation held… Read More ›
Count of Unfilled Construction Jobs Remains Near Cycle High
The count of unfilled jobs in the construction sector was flat in May, remaining near post-Great Recession high levels. According to the BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) and NAHB analysis, the number of open construction sector jobs came in at 243,000. The post-recession high count of open, unfilled construction jobs was 255,000 in July of last year…. Read More ›
Housing Share of GDP: First Quarter 2018
With the release of the final estimate of first quarter 2018 GDP growth (2% growth rate), housing’s share of gross domestic product (GDP) declined slightly to 15.3%. The home building and remodeling component – residential fixed investment – held steady at 3.5%. Housing-related activities contribute to GDP in two basic ways. The first is through residential fixed investment (RFI). RFI is effectively the… Read More ›
Three-story Single-family Homes
Of the 729,000 single-family detached homes started in 2017, a little over 18,000 (2.5 percent) had three or more stories, according to NAHB tabulation of recently released Census data. The data come from the Survey of Construction (SOC, conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau with partial funding from HUD). Although the SOC has always collected data on 3-story single-family homes, the Census Bureau began publishing information on them only recently. Traditionally, the… Read More ›
Mortgage Rates Remain Elevated
The Federal Housing Finance Agency reported that mortgage rates on purchases of newly built homes rose by seven basis points over the month of May 2018 to 4.51 percent, marking the seventh consecutive monthly increase. However, information compiled by Freddie Mac suggests that mortgage rates may have taken a breather in June. Despite the two basis points decline in mortgage… Read More ›