You know an economic report is bleak when the title contains dismal start. Such is the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price indexes report for January 2011. The composite indexes hit new lows, with the home prices of the 20 cities composite index being down -3.1% and the composite-10 dropping -2.0% in comparison to January 2010.
In February, New Residential Single Family Home Sales decreased 16.9% from January, with an annual sale rate of 250,000 new homes. This is a 28 0% drop from a year ago. In February 2010, new home sales were 347,000. January 2011 new home sales was revised to 301,000. February marks an all time record low.
New Residential Single Family Home Sales decreased 12.6% from December, with an annual sale rate of 284,000 new homes. This is in comparison to a seasonally adjusted revised annual rate of 325,000, revised from 329,000, new home sales for December 2010 and is an 18.6% drop in comparison to January's 2010 349,000 new home sales.
New Residential Single Family Home Sales increased 17.5% from November, with an annual sale rate of 329,000 new homes. This is in comparison to a seasonally adjusted revised annual rate of 280,000 new home sales for November. Sales for single family homes are still down -7.6% from this time a year ago.
Housing Starts and Building Permit statistics for October were released today and showed an 11.7% drop from September.
Privately-owned housing starts in October 2010 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 519,000. This is 11.7 percent below the revised September 2010 estimate of 588,000.
Housing Starts dropped -5% in June 2010. Last month housing starts were revised to a -14.9% decline from April.
Privately-owned housing starts in June 2010 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 549,000. This is 5.0 percent below the revised May 2010 estimate of 578,000.
The below St. Louis Fred graph is the monthly percentage change in single units for new housing starts. Single family housing starts dropped -0.7% in June, which is flat in comparison to last month's -17.2% drop.
This is a market purely on life support, sustained by the federal government. Having FHA do this much volume is a sign of a very sick system.
Remember when we pointed out the entire residential real estate market is a ticking time bomb, propped up by the government?
Seems the FHA, which is guaranteeing more loans than Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, thinks so too.
The FHA, which backs loans with down payments as low as 3.5 percent, insured $52.5 billion of home-purchase mortgages in the first quarter, compared with $46 billion of purchases of the debt by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, according to data compiled by Washington-based Potomac Partners.
The FHA and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which regulators seized in 2008, have been financing more than 90 percent of U.S. home lending after a retreat by banks and the collapse of the market for mortgage bonds without government-backed guarantees.
The above quote is in the midst of a feel good existing home sales report:, which increased 7.6% for the month.
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