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Pending Sales Rise, Investor-Buying Plunges In Cliff-Edge US Housing
Pending home sales unexpectedly rose in the US last month, data released on Wednesday showed.
It was the second straight increase and ostensibly bodes well for existing home sales, which are mired in a long-running slump amid a lack of available resale properties.
July's 0.9% increase from June compared favorably with consensus, which expected a 1% decline. The range of estimates from two-dozen human weather-vanes was -5% to 3.2%. Sales fell 14% YoY.
"Jobs are being added thereby enlarging
Some reasonable investors are buying duration. (I’m not one, but their arguments seem plausible.) If you’re willing to buy duration here, and you have ample cashflow, it’s not a huge stretch to be willing to buy a house at 7.5% here, at least a I need somewhere to live kind of house rather than a I am a house flipper kind of house. Highly levered, tax advantaged, effectively subsidized, non-recourse, supply-limited . . . there’s merits.
As a matter of policy, why don’t we just forbid any entity from owning more than two single family dwellings? If we think home ownership is so importanthat we base our tax code around it, then surely we can take other measures to make home ownership more accessible to people.