Current Housing Indicators |
| CURRENT | PREVIOUS | ||
| Existing Home Sales | 4.49m | ▼ | 4.74m |
| New Home Sales | 309,000 | ▼ | 344,000 |
| Housing Starts | 583,000 | ▲ | 477,000 |
| Building Permits | 547,000 | ▲ | 531,000 |
| HMI | 9 | UNCH | 9 |
| Existing Home Prices | $170,300 | ▼ (annually) | $199,800 |
| New Home Prices | $201,100 | ▼ (annually) | $232,400 |
- Citi Mortgage Reveals What Treasury Won't
- Investors May Skew Housing Reality
- 100% Mortgage Financing From USDA
- Despite Government Aid, Foreclosure Crisis is Not Improving
- Housing Data Delivers Mixed Messages
- Appraisals Now Center Stage in Housing Recovery
- Underwater Mortgages Could Sink Even Deeper
- First Time Buyers Rescue Housing: Realtors
- Housing Recovery 'Still In Uncharted Territory': HUD Secretary
- Shadow Inventory Dwarfs Loan Mods
MOST SHARED
- The 'Real' Jobless Rate: 17.5% Of Workers Are Unemployed
- GM's Agreement to Sell Saab To Swedish Firm Falls Apart
- CNBC Anchor Takes a Sabbatical
- Privately Held Facebook Creates Dual-Class Stock
- Buyers Look For Bargains At Luxury Condo Auction
- NBA D-League On The Rise
- Amended Berkshire Hathaway Filing Indicates No Secret Stock Stakes at End of Q3
- Just In Time for Holidays: More Gloom and Doom on Economy
- Behind The Scenes With Warren Buffett
- On Twitter, Beware False Prophets
- S&P to Hit 1,200 by Year-End: Chief Investor
- Amended Berkshire Hathaway Filing Indicates No Secret Stock Stakes at End of Q3
- Facebook's Biggest-Ever Holiday Shopping Season
- Facebook's New Dual Class Structure - Slow Steps to an IPO
- 5 Big Bank Stocks Investors Should Consider: Strategists
- Gambling Drunk, Texting to Live And America's On Sale - Your Emails
- Nov. 24: Unusual Volume Leaders
- NBA D-League On The Rise
- 3D's Tipping Point and Your Living Room
- Citi Mortgage Reveals Something the US Treasury Won't
- Fed Sanguine About US Recovery, Worried on Jobs
- Amended Berkshire Filing Reveals No 'Secret' Holdings
- In Time for Holidays: More Gloom and Doom on Economy
- Turkey Day 101: How Well Do You Know Your Bird?
- Privately Held Facebook Creates Dual-Class Stock
- Holiday Guide to This Season's Smartphones
- Six Ways to Boost Your Income in a Big Way
- Gambling Drunk, Eggos on eBay & More: Your Emails
RSS FEED
Realty Check
![]() |
AP |
What’s interesting to me about this number is that at the beginning of the downturn in housing we didn’t see a huge drop in construction jobs, primarily because workers moved from residential into commercial.
Now that commercial is slowing as well, construction workers are falling out of jobs like flies. And they’re not the only ones. Big surprise furniture manufacturing jobs are falling as well. Domain furniture, a fave of mine, recently went out of business.
Anything related to housing right now appears to be toxic. I even read an article in the Washington Post about how garden centers are doing all they can to get people to spend money on the stuff around their homes. Discounts are big, so get thee to the nursery soon!
But getting back to the jobs number. Nearly half a million jobs gone from one sector alone, and yet you don’t hear so much about jobs in all the talk from lawmakers and policy-makers. It’s all about homeowners/borrowers and bailouts. I wonder if we’re not missing something here.
Questions? Comments?









