by Calculated Risk on 3/31/2006 12:01:00 PM

Recent housing posts of interest:

Shiller on Housing: From the Berkeley Electronic Press, Dr. Robert Shiller writes Long-Term Perspectives on the Current Boom in Home Prices (require email address). Dr. Thoma provides some excerpts here and graphs. UPDATE: Professor Thoma also has excerpts of Dr. Baker's: Government Should Preemptively Burst the Housing Bubble

New Home Sales and Recessions See graph for relationship between New Home Sales and recessions.

MBA Mortgage Application Volume See graph.
Purchase activity is off 14% from last year. This provides further evidence that housing is slowing and suggests that the substantial drop in February New Home Sales was not a statistical anomaly.

February New Home Sales: 1.08 Million. See graphs.
This report is very weak, except for the median and average prices. One month does not make a trend, but New Home Sales have fallen in six of the last seven months.

Comment Period Ends: Interagency Guidance on Nontraditional Mortgage Products
Update on the new mortgage guidance and the comments from banks and lenders (mostly negative).