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New Versus ‘Used’: A Tale Of Two Housing Markets
New US home sales held up pretty well in August, data out Wednesday showed, even as expectations for lower rates and a hangover from July's big increase meant the pace slowed.
Economists expected to hear that sales of newly-constructed self-storage units for people (hat tip again to a reader for that oh-so-apt characterization of new-builds) fell 6% from the prior month. Instead, they dropped just 4.7%.
The annual pace, 716,000, was among the best in years despite the month-to-month decline.
I wonder if buyers of new houses a year ago have seen their home values rise with existing houses or fall with new houses. Technically their houses are “existing” but in reality they are indistinguishable from all the new self-storage units for sale in the same and similar developments.
Well, new home sales are a bigger factor where there is land to build on. That leaves out large commutable metro suburbs, and the northeast.
467,000×493,000=$230 billion
It could be worse. Like the over two years of inventory that Chinese builders are trying to move.
Not to quibble, but with 61% of builders offering incentives according to the NAHB survey, there’s actually a premium to buy used it would appear.