Eye On Housing
The labor market continues to tighten. In the September BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) data, the national number of job quits for all sectors (4.4 million) was up 34% year-over-year as worker churn accelerates. Total national job openings stands at 10.4 million. What had been, in prior years, a challenge in certain sectors, like construction, continues as… Read More ›
The Federal Reserve has supported the housing market during the virus crisis, the 2020 recession, and the subsequent, ongoing recovery via asset-backed purchases (among other tools), including $40 billion a month of mortgage-backed security (MBS) purchases. These MBS purchases have held interest rates lower than they otherwise would have been. Beginning in November, the Fed will reduce the monthly volume of… Read More ›
Thanks to a surge in residential investment during 2020, housing’s share of GDP remains elevated compared to recent years. Last year’s market conditions involved a renewed focus on the importance of home, an evolving geography of housing demand, and a lack of for-sale inventory. Housing has continued to expand in 2021, although as the rest of the economy recovers, the housing… Read More ›
Contracts for new, single-family home sales increased 14% to an 800,000 seasonally adjusted annual rate in September according to estimates from the joint release of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the U.S. Census Bureau. On a year-over-year basis, the September estimate was 18% lower than a year ago, when an unsustainable rebound took hold in… Read More ›
Home building, like other U.S. industries, has been dealing with the supply side challenges of labor and material shortages. Unlike other industries, however, home builders confront an additional challenge in obtaining lots on which to build. In a recent NAHB survey, 76 percent of builders reported that the overall supply of developed lots in their areas was low to very… Read More ›
Total housing starts decreased 1.6% in September, according to data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. Census Bureau. Single-family starts were flat for the month, while overall multifamily starts declined in August. The August total starts reading of 1.56 million starts is the number of housing units builders would begin if development kept this… Read More ›
Strong consumer demand helped push builder confidence higher in October despite growing affordability challenges stemming from rising material prices and shortages. Builder sentiment in the market for newly built single-family homes moved four points higher to 80 in October, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index. Despite the increase, builders are getting increasingly concerned… Read More ›
The NAHB/Royal Building Products Remodeling Market Index (RMI) for the third quarter posted a reading of 87, up five points from the third quarter of 2020. The reading is a sign of positive residential remodeler sentiment for projects of all sizes. The RMI is based on a survey that asks remodelers to rate various aspects of the remodeling market “good,”… Read More ›
In the August labor market data, job openings for the overall economy remained elevated at 10.4 million open positions. What had been a challenge in certain sectors, like construction, continues as a broad labor access issue as businesses seek workers as the economy expands. The count of open construction jobs was stable at 344,000 unfilled positions, according to data from… Read More ›
Of the roughly 990,000 single-family homes started in 2020, only 19.3 percent included decks, according to NAHB tabulation of data from the Survey of Construction (SOC, conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau and partially funded by HUD). This marks the third year in a row the share of new homes with decks has declined, and the first time the share… Read More ›