Global| Nov 28 2012U.S. New Home Sales Are Depressed
by:Tom Moeller
|in:Economy in Brief
Summary
New home buyers were hesitant to commit last month. New home sales in October slipped 0.3% to 368,000 (SAAR) from 369,000 during September, revised from 389,000. The figure fell short of Consensus expectations for 388,000 sales. Home [...]
New home buyers were hesitant to commit last month. New home sales in October slipped 0.3% to 368,000 (SAAR) from 369,000 during September, revised from 389,000. The figure fell short of Consensus expectations for 388,000 sales. Home sales in the Northeast fell by nearly one third m/m (+10.5% y/y) to 21,000. Also depressed were sales in the South which fell 11.6% (+9.3% y/y) to 176,000. The Commerce Department indicated that there was "minimal" effect on the data from Hurricane Sandy. Conversely, new home sales in the Midwest jumped by nearly-two thirds (17.6% y/y) to 60,000 and sales in the West rose 8.8% (33.7% y/y) to 111,000.
Home pricing also suffered last month and the median price of a new single family home fell 4.2% to $237,700 (+5.7% y/y) but prices in prior months were revised higher. The average price fell to $278,900 (8.0% y/y) during October.
The length of time to sell a new home fell sharply m/m to 5.9 months last month, the least since 2007. The inventory of unsold homes at 147,000 (-7.5% y/y) remained near its all time low. This is a 4.8 month supply at the current sales rate and down from the early-2009 high of 12.2 months.
The data in this report are available in Haver's USECON database. The consensus expectation figure is from the Action Economics survey and is available in the AS1REPNA database.
| U.S. New Home Sales | Oct | Sep | Aug | Y/Y % | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total (SAAR, 000s) | 368 | 369 | 366 | 17.2 | 307 | 321 | 374 |
| Northeast | 21 | 31 | 26 | 10.5 | 21 | 31 | 31 |
| Midwest | 60 | 37 | 55 | 17.6 | 45 | 45 | 54 |
| South | 176 | 199 | 178 | 9.3 | 169 | 173 | 202 |
| West | 111 | 102 | 107 | 33.7 | 72 | 74 | 87 |
| Median Price (NSA, $) | $237,700 | $248,000 | $254,000 | 5.7 | 224,317 | 221,242 | 214,500 |
Tom Moeller
AuthorMore in Author Profile »Prior to joining Haver Analytics in 2000, Mr. Moeller worked as the Economist at Chancellor Capital Management from 1985 to 1999. There, he developed comprehensive economic forecasts and interpreted economic data for equity and fixed income portfolio managers. Also at Chancellor, Mr. Moeller worked as an equity analyst and was responsible for researching and rating companies in the economically sensitive automobile and housing industries for investment in Chancellor’s equity portfolio. Prior to joining Chancellor, Mr. Moeller was an Economist at Citibank from 1979 to 1984. He also analyzed pricing behavior in the metals industry for the Council on Wage and Price Stability in Washington, D.C. In 1999, Mr. Moeller received the award for most accurate forecast from the Forecasters' Club of New York. From 1990 to 1992 he was President of the New York Association for Business Economists. Mr. Moeller earned an M.B.A. in Finance from Fordham University, where he graduated in 1987. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from George Washington University.
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