US Pending Home Sales Boom In Latest Threat To Fed
If pending home sales are a leading indicator, the long run of monthly declines in US existing home sales may soon be over.
In what counted as yet another piece of evidence to support the notion that "animal spirits" are stirring across the world's largest economy, pending home sales surged more than 8% in January, according to data released Monday.
That was three full percentage points above the highest guess from two-dozen economists, and came on the heels of December's surprise uptick which
Frankly, I like the new AI-generated article artwork you’ve started using for some of the posts. This one has the clearest hallmarks (standard Diffusion-style wording on the road sign, road sign implausibly placed in the middle of a driveway/sidewalk), but there’s been lots of these since the change to the new H+ format. More variety now in the art than before, but in any case and from whatever source, it’s a breath of fresh air to have original artwork for articles, it really adds to the readability. Worth the price of admission right there, as if the content wasn’t already the best.
I’m glad somebody understands why this is important. Although longtime, superfans have an affinity for some of my “classic” banner images, etc., I have to keep in mind that thousands of people are consuming this content each day, and I want every minute of that experience to be enjoyable, which entails constantly trying to keep it fresh.
Also, I deliberately choose some of the generations with implausible elements, almost as a kind of subtle nod to René Magritte. The trick is not going overboard with the implausibility, tempting though it is. Also, I hope readers understand: This isn’t as simple as clicking “generate.” For every one you see that “works,” there were dozens upon dozens that didn’t. This, like everything else I do, takes a lot of care and effort.
Housing turnover is slow, although January was better. Weather and the dip in mortgage rates helped, as did price cuts. Mortgage rates are back up, the weather, who knows? A one month trend especially in a slow time of year not meaningful. If you saw a busy spring for 3 months, that would be very meaningful.