A measure of Americans who signed contracts to buy homes increased last month to its highest level in two and a half years, the latest sign of improvement in the once-battered housing market. The National Association of Realtors said Friday that its seasonally adjusted pending home sales index rose 1.7 percent in November from October to 106.4.
This week we turn the calendar page, and that change brings with it a raft of economic data. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke will deliver his semiannual monetary policy testimony before Congress, while Wall Street waits on more earnings reports.
With corporate earnings season in full swing -- watch for McDonalds, along with Catepillar, Amazon and other -- and with the Fed meeting on interest rates, the GDP estimate and housing numbers coming out -- the week ahead is expected to be quite busy.
Doomsayers insist the recent rapid rise in yields means the nation's creditors are finally getting fed up with financing U.S. deficits. But a stronger argument says the cause is better-than-expected economic reports that have been piling up recently.
Aided by an improving job market and comparatively low mortgage rates, U.S. pending home sales surged a record 10.4% in October. Still, the latest new- and existing-home sales reports suggest a sluggish housing recovery at least into early 2011.
Pending home sales in the U.S. unexpectedly fell 1.8% in September, the National Association of Realtors reported Friday. It was the statistic's first decline in three months, and one that suggests that the housing sector's recovery is likely to remain uneven through at least early 2011.
U.S. pending home sales rose a better-than-expected 4.3% in August. The second straight monthly rise in pending sales may be another sign of housing sector stabilization, or it may merely reflect an elongated impact of the home buyer tax credit.
U.S. pending home sales unexpectedly rose 5.2% in July -- a rise that may be a sign of housing sector stabilization, or it may merely reflect an elongated impact of the home buyer tax credit, due to an extended closing deadline.
Investors nervous about a stalled economic recovery -- or possibly the second dip of a double-dip recession -- will watch for this week's economic data, including construction and consumer spending, factory orders and August jobless figures.
The U.S. housing market suffered another modest setback in June as pending sales of homes fell 2.6%, but less than the 3.7% consensus estimate. Still, pending sales are now 18.6% lower than the June 2009 figure.
One victory, one setback regarding two, key May economic data points. Construction spending fell less-than-expected in May after surging in April, but pending home sales plunged 30% -- pushed lower by the approach of the end of the home buyer tax credit on April 30.
With the federal home buyer tax credit serving as a tailwind, pending home sales rose 5.3% in March, the National Association of Realtors said. The trend is good news for the sector and the economy, but job growth will be needed to sustain it in the long-term.
