February Existing Home Sales Fell 23.8%
Today's fictional headline, via The Onion, National Association of Realtors: "Sales of existing homes increased in February and remain within a fairly stable range."
Why is this fictional? Changes from January to February are measuring seasonal differences, not actual improvements. January is one of the slowest months of the year for home sales. (We would never report retail sales from December to January this way; We always use year over year data).
What dos that show Year over year changes showed that single family home sales were 23.8% below February 2007 levels.
The national median sales price was also a big surprise, freefalling down 8.2%.
Single-family home sales decreased 22.9%, while the median existing single-family home price was $193,900 in February, down 8.7% from year ago prices.
The best news in the release was the 3% decrease in total housing inventory. At the end of February, there were 4.03 million homes for sale -- 9.96-month supply.
(NOTE: The original NAR report was correct)
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graphic courtesy of Barron's Econoday
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UPDATE: March 24, 2008, 11:27am
I think both the WSJ and Bloomberg got this wrong:
-Home Resales Rose 2.9% Last Month As Median Price Dropped 8.2%
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Source:
Existing Home Sales Rise In February
National Association of Realtors, March 24, 2008
http://www.realtor.org/press_room/news_releases/2008/existing_home_sales_rise_in_february.html
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Monday, March 24, 2008 | 10:16 AM | Permalink
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Comments
Your reliance on numbers, facts, and reality is crimping my spin. I'm the best, you know.
Trust me: this housing "downturn" (as if), is just a bump in the road to permanent wealth for every man, woman, and child on the planet.
Posted by: Lawrence Yun | Mar 24, 2008 10:22:49 AM
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