by Calculated Risk on 8/13/2024 08:48:00 AM

Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Part 1: Current State of the Housing Market; Overview for mid-August 2024

A brief excerpt:

This 2-part overview for mid-August provides a snapshot of the current housing market.

I always focus first on inventory, since inventory usually tells the tale!
...
Here is a graph of new listing from Realtor.com’s July 2024 Monthly Housing Market Trends Report showing new listings were up 3.6% year-over-year in June. New listings are still well below pre-pandemic levels. From Realtor.com:

Sellers continued to list their homes in higher numbers this July as newly listed homes were 3.6% above last year’s levels but substantially less than June’s figure of 6.3%. This marks the ninth month of increasing listing activity after a 17-month streak of decline.

Note the seasonality for new listings. December and January are seasonally the weakest months of the year for new listings, followed by February and November. New listings will be up year-over-year in 2024, but still below normal levels.

There are always people that need to sell due to the so-called 3 D’s: Death, Divorce, and Disease. Also, in certain times, some homeowners will need to sell due to unemployment or excessive debt (neither is much of an issue right now).

And there are homeowners who want to sell for a number of reasons: upsizing (more babies), downsizing, moving for a new job, or moving to a nicer home or location (move-up buyers). It is some of the “want to sell” group that has been locked in with the golden handcuffs over the last couple of years, since it is financially difficult to move when your current mortgage rate is around 3%, and your new mortgage rate will around 6.5%.

But time is a factor for this “want to sell” group, and eventually some of them will take the plunge. That is probably why we are seeing more new listings now.

There is much more in the article.

by Calculated Risk on 8/12/2024 07:10:00 PM

From Matthew Graham at Mortgage News Daily: Mortgage Rates Effectively Unchanged to Begin New Week

Today was completely different than the previous Monday in that it was a normal, boring day with essentially no change in mortgage rates over the weekend.
...
This could change in the coming days as important new economic reports are released. Wednesday's Consumer Price Index (CPI) is the biggest deal, but tomorrow's Producer Price Index (PPI) could play a supporting role. [30 year fixed 6.55%]
emphasis added

Tuesday:
• At 6:00 AM ET, NFIB Small Business Optimism Index for July.

8:30 AM, The Producer Price Index for July from the BLS. The consensus is for a 0.2% increase in PPI, and a 0.2% increase in core PPI.

by Calculated Risk on 8/12/2024 02:16:00 PM

The key economic report this week is July CPI to be released on Wednesday. The consensus is for a 0.2% increase in CPI, and a 0.2% increase in core CPI.  The consensus is for CPI to be up 3.0% year-over-year and core CPI to be up 3.2% YoY.

From BofA:

We forecast headline CPI rose by 0.3% m/m in July, owing mainly to a pickup in core services inflation and energy prices. This would leave the y/y rate unchanged at 3.0%. Meanwhile, we expect core CPI increased by 0.2% m/m. While this is not quite as low as June, it is in line with prior trend in deflation and should meet the Fed's benchmark for beginning rate cuts in September.

From Goldman:

We forecast a 0.16% increase (vs. 0.2% consensus) in core CPI prices in July.
We estimate a 0.17% rise in headline CPI, reflecting higher food (+0.15%) and energy (+0.4%) prices.

by Calculated Risk on 8/12/2024 11:12:00 AM

Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: 2nd Look at Local Housing Markets in July

A brief excerpt:

NOTE: The tables for active listings, new listings and closed sales all include a comparison to July 2019 for each local market (some 2019 data is not available).

This is the second look at local markets in July. I’m tracking over 40 local housing markets in the US. Some of the 40 markets are states, and some are metropolitan areas. I’ll update these tables throughout the month as additional data is released.

Closed sales in July were mostly for contracts signed in May and June when 30-year mortgage rates averaged 7.06% and 6.92%, respectively (Freddie Mac PMMS).
...
In July, sales in these markets were up 4.8% YoY. Last month, in June, these same markets were down 10.9% year-over-year Not Seasonally Adjusted (NSA).

Important: There were two more working days in July 2024 compared to July 2023 (22 vs 20), so seasonally adjusted sales will be much lower than the NSA data suggests. This is the opposite of what happened in June.

Sales in all of these markets are down significantly compared to July 2019.
...
Many more local markets to come!

There is much more in the article.

by Calculated Risk on 8/12/2024 08:12:00 AM

Altos reports that active single-family inventory was up 1.3% week-over-week. Inventory is now up 40.2% from the February seasonal bottom.

Click on graph for larger image.

This inventory graph is courtesy of Altos Research.

As of August 9th, inventory was at 693 thousand (7-day average), compared to 684 thousand the prior week.   

This is the highest level of inventory since June 2020; however, inventory is still well below pre-pandemic levels. 

The second graph shows the seasonal pattern for active single-family inventory since 2015.

The red line is for 2024.  The black line is for 2019.  

Inventory was up 40.5% compared to the same week in 2023 (last week it was up 39.9%), and down 27.5% compared to the same week in 2019 (last week it was down 28.9%). 

Back in June 2023, inventory was down almost 54% compared to 2019, so the gap to more normal inventory levels is slowly closing.

Mike Simonsen discusses this data regularly on Youtube.

by Calculated Risk on 8/11/2024 06:49:00 PM

Weekend:
• Schedule for Week of August 11, 2024

Monday:
• No major economic releases scheduled.

From CNBC: Pre-Market Data and Bloomberg futures S&P 500 are down 10 and DOW futures are down 66 (fair value).

Oil prices were up over the last week with WTI futures at $76.84 per barrel and Brent at $79.66 per barrel. A year ago, WTI was at $83, and Brent was at $88 - so WTI oil prices are down about 7% year-over-year.

Here is a graph from Gasbuddy.com for nationwide gasoline prices. Nationally prices are at $3.41 per gallon. A year ago, prices were at $3.82 per gallon, so gasoline prices are down $0.41 year-over-year.

by Calculated Risk on 8/10/2024 02:11:00 PM

At the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter this week:

Click on graph for larger image.

• 1st Look at Local Housing Markets in July Early Reports Suggest New Cycle Low for NAR reported Sales in July

• ICE Mortgage Monitor: Existing Home Inventory Surges in Florida and Texas

• How Much will the Fannie & Freddie Conforming Loan Limit Change for 2025?

• Atlanta Fed: Home Ownership Affordability Monitor

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

by Calculated Risk on 8/10/2024 08:11:00 AM

The key reports this week are July CPI, Retail Sales and Housing Starts.

For manufacturing, the Industrial Production report will be released.

----- Monday, August 12th -----
No major economic releases scheduled.

----- Tuesday, August 13th -----
6:00 AM ET: NFIB Small Business Optimism Index for July.

8:30 AM: The Producer Price Index for July from the BLS. The consensus is for a 0.2% increase in PPI, and a 0.2% increase in core PPI.

----- Wednesday, August 14th -----
7:00 AM ET: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

8:30 AM: The Consumer Price Index for July from the BLS. The consensus is for a 0.2% increase in CPI, and a 0.2% increase in core CPI.  The consensus is for CPI to be up 3.0% year-over-year and core CPI to be up 3.2% YoY.

----- Thursday, August 15th -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released.  The consensus is for 238 thousand initial claims, up from 233 thousand last week.

8:30 AM: Retail sales for July is scheduled to be released.  The consensus is for 0.3% increase in retail sales.

This graph shows retail sales since 1992. This is monthly retail sales and food service, seasonally adjusted (total and ex-gasoline)

8:30 AM: The New York Fed Empire State manufacturing survey for August. The consensus is for a reading of -6.0, up from -6.6.

8:30 AM: the Philly Fed manufacturing survey for August. The consensus is for a reading of 6.5, down from 14.0.

9:15 AM: The Fed will release Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization for July.

This graph shows industrial production since 1967.

The consensus is for a 0.1% increase in Industrial Production, and for Capacity Utilization to decrease to 78.7%.

10:00 AM: The August NAHB homebuilder survey. The consensus is for a reading of 42, unchanged from 42. Any number below 50 indicates that more builders view sales conditions as poor than good.

----- Friday, August 16th -----
8:30 AM ET: Housing Starts for July.

This graph shows single and multi-family housing starts since 1968.

The consensus is for 1.342 million SAAR, down from 1.353 million SAAR in June.

10:00 AM: State Employment and Unemployment (Monthly) for July 2024

10:00 AM: University of Michigan's Consumer sentiment index (Preliminary for August)

by Calculated Risk on 8/09/2024 07:35:00 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🚩	457	435	≤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 above the goal again.  

And here is a graph I'm following concerning COVID in wastewater as of August 9th:

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

COVID in wastewater is increasing everywhere.

by Calculated Risk on 8/09/2024 02:01:00 PM

Here is another monthly update on lumber prices.

SPECIAL NOTE: The CME group discontinued the Random Length Lumber Futures contract on May 16, 2023.  I switched to a physically-delivered Lumber Futures contract that was started in August 2022. 

Unfortunately, this impacts long term price comparisons since the new contract was priced about 24% higher than the old random length contract for the period when both contracts were available.

This graph shows CME random length framing futures through last August (blue), and the new physically-delivered Lumber Futures (LBR) contract starting in August 2022 (Red).

LBR is currently at $514.00 per 1000 board feet, up 4% from a year ago.

Click on graph for larger image.

There is somewhat of a seasonal demand for lumber, and lumber prices frequently peak in the first half of the year.

We didn't see a significant runup in the Spring period of 2023 or 2024 due to the housing slowdown.