by Calculated Risk on 7/21/2024 10:16:00 AM

For house prices, probably the key number in the existing home sales report on Tuesday will be months-of-supply.

It is likely month-of-supply will be close to 4 months in the June report, the highest level since the start of the pandemic. In June 2019, months-of-supply peaked for the year at 4.3 months.

As I mentioned in a recent interview with Lance Lambert at ResiClub:

"I expect this measure to continue to increase, and be over 4 months soon – and to be above 2019 levels in a few months. This doesn’t mean national price declines, but it suggests price growth will slow significantly later this year. We might see national price decline with months-of-supply above 5 (as opposed to 6) since most potential sellers have substantial equity and might be willing to sell for a little less."

by Calculated Risk on 7/20/2024 02:21:00 PM

At the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter this week:

Click on graph for larger image.

• Single Family Starts Up Year-over-year in June; Multi-Family Starts Down 23% YoY

• Lawler: Early Read on Existing Home Sales in June

• Part 2: Current State of the Housing Market; Overview for mid-July 2024

• California Home Sales Down 3% SA YoY in June; 4th Look at Local Housing Markets in June

• 3rd Look at Local Housing Markets in June

This is usually published 4 to 6 times a week and provides more in-depth analysis of the housing market.

by Calculated Risk on 7/20/2024 09:32:00 AM

The key report this week is the advance estimate of Q2 GDP.

Other key reports include June Existing Home Sales, New Home Sales, and Personal Income and Outlays.

For manufacturing, the July Richmond and Kansas City Fed manufacturing surveys will be released.

----- Monday, July 22nd -----
8:30 AM ET: Chicago Fed National Activity Index for June. This is a composite index of other data.

----- Tuesday, July 23rd -----
10:00 AM: Existing Home Sales for June from the National Association of Realtors (NAR). The consensus is for 4.00 million SAAR, down from 4.11 million last month.

The graph shows existing home sales from 1994 through the report last month.

Housing economist Tom Lawler expects the NAR to report sales of 3.93 million SAAR for June.

10:00 AM: Richmond Fed Survey of Manufacturing Activity for July.

----- Wednesday, July 24th -----
7:00 AM ET: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

10:00 AM: New Home Sales for June from the Census Bureau.

This graph shows New Home Sales since 1963. The dashed line is the sales rate for last month.

The consensus is for 640 thousand SAAR, up from 619 thousand in May.

During the day: The AIA's Architecture Billings Index for June (a leading indicator for commercial real estate).

----- Thursday, July 25th -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released.  The consensus is for 238 thousand initial claims, down from 243 thousand last week.

8:30 AM: Gross Domestic Product, 2nd quarter (advance estimate), and annual update. The consensus is that real GDP increased 1.8% annualized in Q2, up from 1.4% in Q1.

8:30 AM: Durable Goods Orders for June from the Census Bureau. The consensus is for a 0.5% increase in durable goods orders.

11:00 AM: Kansas City Fed Survey of Manufacturing Activity for July.

----- Friday, July 26th -----
8:30 AM ET: Personal Income and Outlays, June 2024. The consensus is for a 0.4% increase in personal income, and for a 0.2% increase in personal spending. And for the Core PCE price index to increase 0.2%.  PCE prices are expected to be up 2.6% YoY, and core PCE prices up 2.6% YoY.

10:00 AM: University of Michigan's Consumer sentiment index (Final for July). The consensus is for a reading of 66.0.

by Calculated Risk on 7/19/2024 07:01:00 PM

Note: Mortgage rates are from MortgageNewsDaily.com and are for top tier scenarios.

For deaths, I'm currently using 4 weeks ago for "now", since the most recent three weeks will be revised significantly.

Note: "Effective May 1, 2024, hospitals are no longer required to report COVID-19 hospital admissions, hospital capacity, or hospital occupancy data."  So I'm no longer tracking hospitalizations.

COVID Metrics
	Now	Week Ago	Goal
Deaths per Week🚩	385	342	≤3501
1my goals to stop weekly posts, 🚩 Increasing number weekly for Deaths ✅ Goal met.

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows the weekly (columns) number of deaths reported.

Although weekly deaths met the original goal to stop posting, I'm going to continue to post now that deaths are increasing again.  

And here is a graph I'm following concerning COVID in wastewater as of July 11th:

This appears to be a leading indicator for COVID hospitalizations and deaths.

COVID in wastewater is increasing - especially in the West and South - and unfortunately this suggests weekly deaths will increase further. 

by Calculated Risk on 7/19/2024 12:13:00 PM

Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Lawler: Early Read on Existing Home Sales in June

A brief excerpt:

From housing economist Tom Lawler:

Based on publicly-available local realtor/MLS reports released across the country through today, I project that existing home sales as estimated by the National Association of Realtors ran at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.93 million in June, down 4.4%  from May’s preliminary pace and down 4.4% from last June’s seasonally adjusted pace.

Unadjusted sales should show a materially larger YOY % decline, reflecting this June’s two fewer business days compared to last June.

There is much more in the article.

by Calculated Risk on 7/19/2024 09:58:00 AM

Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: California Home Sales Down 3% SA YoY in June; 4th Look at Local Housing Markets in June

A brief excerpt:

The National Association of Realtors (NAR) is scheduled to release June Existing Home Sales on Tuesday July 23rd at 10 AM ET. The early consensus is for 4.00 million SAAR, down from 4.11 million in May, and down from 4.11 million in June 2023.
...
In June, sales in these markets were down 12.7% YoY. Last month, in May, these same markets were down 0.6% year-over-year Not Seasonally Adjusted (NSA).
...
This is a year-over-year decrease NSA for these early reporting markets. However, there were two fewer working days in June 2024 compared to June 2023 (19 vs 21), so seasonally adjusted sales will be much higher than the NSA data suggests.
...
More local markets to come!

There is much more in the article.

by Calculated Risk on 7/19/2024 07:59:00 AM

The advance estimate of 2nd quarter GDP will be released next week.

From BofA:

Our 2Q GDP tracking estimate is up two-tenths to 2.4% q/q saar since our last publication, largely due to higher-than-expected industrial production (IP) and housing starts and permits [July 18th estimate]
emphasis added

From Goldman:

We boosted our Q2 GDP tracking estimate by 0.3pp to +2.6% (qoq ar) and our Q2 domestic final sales forecast by 0.1pp to 2.2%. [July 17th estimate]

And from the Altanta Fed: GDPNow

The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the second quarter of 2024 is 2.7 percent on July 17, up from 2.5 percent on July 16. After this morning's housing starts report from the US Census Bureau and industrial production report from the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, the nowcasts of second-quarter real personal consumption expenditures growth and second-quarter real gross private domestic investment growth increased from 2.1 percent and 7.7 percent, respectively, to 2.2 percent and 8.9 percent. [July 17th estimate]

by Calculated Risk on 7/18/2024 03:54:00 PM

From STR: U.S. hotel results for week ending 13 July

The U.S. hotel industry reported higher performance results than the previous week but lower comparisons year over year, according to CoStar’s latest data through 13 July. ...

7-13 July 2024 (percentage change from comparable week in 2023):

• Occupancy: 69.2% (-3.7%)
• Average daily rate (ADR): US$158.21 (-1.5%)
• Revenue per available room (RevPAR): US$109.51 (-5.2%)
emphasis added

The following graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four-week average.

Click on graph for larger image.

The red line is for 2024, blue is the median, and dashed light blue is for 2023.  Dashed purple is for 2018, the record year for hotel occupancy. 

The 4-week average of the occupancy rate is tracking just behind last year and is below the median rate for the period 2000 through 2023 (Blue).

Note: Y-axis doesn't start at zero to better show the seasonal change.

The 4-week average of the occupancy rate will increase seasonally due to summer recreational travel.  So far, the summer leisure travel season has disappointed.

by Calculated Risk on 7/18/2024 01:41:00 PM

What this means: On a weekly basis, Realtor.com reports the year-over-year change in active inventory and new listings. On a monthly basis, they report total inventory. For June, Realtor.com reported inventory was up 36.7% YoY, but still down 32.4% compared to April 2017 to 2019 levels. 

 Now - on a weekly basis - inventory is up 35.8% YoY.

Realtor.com has monthly and weekly data on the existing home market. Here is their weekly report: Weekly Housing Trends View—Data for Week Ending July 13, 2024

• Active inventory increased, with for-sale homes 35.8% above year-ago levels.

For the 36th week in a row, the number of for-sale homes grew compared with one year ago. This past week, the inventory of homes for sale grew by 35.8% compared with last year, slightly higher than the rate observed in the previous week. Despite nearly 8 months of building inventory, buyers still see more than 30% fewer homes for sale compared with pre-pandemic.

• New listings–a measure of sellers putting homes up for sale–were up this week by 8.8% from one year ago.

This week marks 14 out of the past 15 weeks with new listings growth and at 8.8% year-over-year it is slightly above the 2024 weekly average of 8.7%. However, the share of active listings comprising new listings fell from the same last year by just under a percentage point. While newly listed homes increased by 6.3% annually in June, this rate is roughly half of what it was two months ago. Broadly speaking, the number of new homes for sale remains historically low and is still below the 2017-2022 levels, even with recent improvements.

Here is a graph of the year-over-year change in inventory according to realtor.com. 

Inventory was up year-over-year for the 36th consecutive week.  

However, inventory is still historically low.

New listings remain below typical pre-pandemic levels.

by Calculated Risk on 7/18/2024 11:15:00 AM

Container traffic gives us an idea about the volume of goods being exported and imported - and usually some hints about the trade report since LA area ports handle about 40% of the nation's container port traffic.

The following graphs are for inbound and outbound traffic at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach in TEUs (TEUs: 20-foot equivalent units or 20-foot-long cargo container).

To remove the strong seasonal component for inbound traffic, the first graph shows the rolling 12-month average.

Click on graph for larger image.

On a rolling 12-month basis, inbound traffic increased 1.7% in June compared to the rolling 12 months ending in May.   Outbound traffic increased 0.7% compared to the rolling 12 months ending the previous month.

The 2nd graph is the monthly data (with a strong seasonal pattern for imports).

Usually imports peak in the July to October period as retailers import goods for the Christmas holiday, and then decline sharply and bottom in the Winter depending on the timing of the Chinese New Year.  

Imports were up 20% YoY in June, and exports were up 9% YoY.    

In general, it appears port traffic is returning to the pre-pandemic patterns.