A Snapshot of Monthly Housing Indicators
Updated May 21, 2009

Pending Home Sales Index
Pending home sales rose with many first-time buyers taking advantage of historically good housing affordability conditions. The Pending Home Sales Index, a forward-looking indicator based on contracts signed in March, increased 3.2 percent to 84.6 from a level of 82.0 in February, and is 1.1 percent higher than March 2008 when it was 83.7. The Pending Home Sales Index in the South rose 8.5 percent to 93.2 in March and is 7.7 percent above a year ago.

Existing-Home Sales
Existing-home sales eased in March but first-time buyers are responding to low mortgage interest rates and tax credits, according to the National Association of Realtors®.  Existing-home sales – including single-family, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops – declined 3.0 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate1 of 4.57 million units in March from a downwardly revised level of 4.71 million in February, and were 7.1 percent lower than the 4.92 million-unit pace in March 2008. In the South, existing-home sales slipped 1.7 percent to an annual pace of 1.71 million in March and are 10.9 percent below a year ago. The median price in the South was $146,900, down 12.2 percent from March 2008.

New-Home Sales
New home sales declined 10.2% in January, posting a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 309,000 units. New home sales were off 48.2% from their level in January of 2008. While the actual number of new homes available for sale decreased, the months’ supply of inventory rose to 13.3 at the current sales pace. 

Housing Starts
Housing starts fell 10.8 percent in March to a rate of 510,000 from the revised February figure of 572,000. On an annual basis, housing starts are down 48.4 percent. The decline in March was due to a slowdown in multi-family construction, as single-family housing starts were unchanged. Building permits fell 9 percent in March to 513,000, down from the revised February rate of 564,000. From the March 2008 rate of 932,000, housing starts are down 45 percent.

Housing Affordability
NAR’s Housing Affordability Index remained near record highs. The affordability index was 166.7 in March – down from an upwardly revised record of 174.4 in February due to higher home prices in March. The index remains 30.8 percentage points higher than a year ago. The HAI is a broad measure of housing affordability using consistent values and assumptions over time, which examines the relationship between home prices, mortgage interest rates and family income; tracking began in 1970. 

Mortgage Rates
The 30-year fixed mortgage rate is currently up .4 percent to 4.82 percent.

Employment
The economy continues to bleed jobs, as employers cut 651,000 jobs in February. While that is down from January’s revised job loss of 655,000, the figure for December was revised upward to 681,000. Unemployment rose to 8.1% -- its highest level in 25 years. Based on company payroll data, the latest report shows that since January of 2008, the economy has shed 4.4 million jobs, with more than 3.3 million of them lost over the last six months.

Economic Growth
The economy contracted at a 6.2% annual rate from the third to the fourth quarter of 2008 – a significantly larger negative GDP growth figure than originally estimated based on more complete data. Third quarter GDP growth was -0.5%. Contributing to the negative growth were decreases in consumer and business spending, residential fixed investment, as well as a downturn in exports, but federal government spending did rise.

Other Indicators
GDP - Down 6.3% from Q4 2008
Consumer Confidence - Down 32.35% from February
Consumer Price Index - Up .1% in April 
Producer Price Index - Up .3% in April
Retail Sales - Down .4% from March

Source: National Association of REALTORS^®, unless otherwise indicated.