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Tag: New Home Sales

  • Houston new-home sales recede at start of 2026 – Houston Agent Magazine

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    New-home sales declined 7% month over month in Houston in January, according to the latest report from HomesUSA.com.

    Homebuyers purchased 1,998 new homes during the month, down from 2,157 in December. Sales also decreased annually, with 2,046 homes sold in January 2025.

    Days on market increased to 98.55, up from 95.67 a month prior and 89.43 days a year prior.

    Pending sales declined from 1,532 in December to 1,463 in January. A year ago, 1,797 listings went under contract.

    “January new-home sales numbers reflect seasonality, and I believe the Houston market will soon strengthen,” said Ben Caballero, CEO of HomesUSA.com. “Spring is always the best time for home sales.

    Amid decreased sales, the average new-home price decreased 1% month over month from $400,111 to $396,723. In January 2025, the average new-home price was $395,515.

    “With this year’s tax cuts, consumers will have more money, then the spring selling season will kick in soon, followed by a new Fed chairman focused on lowering interest rates,” Caballero added. “I will be surprised if Houston-area housing doesn’t have a very good year.”

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    Emily Marek

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  • US new home sales surged in September | CNN Business

    US new home sales surged in September | CNN Business

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    Washington, DC
    CNN
     — 

    New home sales in the United States surged higher in September from the month before, even as mortgage rates remained over 7%, making financing a home costlier and pushing people out of the market.

    Sales of newly constructed homes jumped 12.3% in September to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 759,000, from a revised rate of 676,000 in August, according to a joint report from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Census Bureau. Sales were up 33.9% from a year ago.

    This represents the fastest pace of sales since February 2022 and easily exceeds analysts’ expectations of a sales pace of 680,000.

    Sales of existing homes have been trending down since February and are down 20% year to date in September from a year ago. There is an ongoing inventory and affordability crunch that has homeowners with mortgage rates of 3% or 4% reluctant to sell and buy another home at a much higher rate. In August, rates topped 7% and have lingered there as the Federal Reserve continues to address inflation.

    The average rate for a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage was 7.63% last week, according to Freddie Mac, and there are indications it could continue to climb.

    “With one more Fed interest rate hike expected for the year, interest rates are not anticipated to drop any time soon,” said Kelly Mangold of RCLCO Real Estate Consulting.

    New construction has been an appealing alternative, attracting determined buyers frustrated by the historically low supply of existing homes. Still, affordability concerns remain.

    “The constraints in the housing market have created a significant amount of pent-up demand, as more and more households are living in homes they may have outgrown and are deciding to buy despite current market conditions,” said Mangold.

    According to the report, new home sales activity increased the most in the south, “a region that continues to outperform due to availability of land, population and job growth, and a relatively lower cost of living,” said Mangold.

    While new home sales are a much smaller share of the overall sales market than existing home sales, the inventory picture is rosier for new construction homes.

    The seasonally adjusted estimate of new homes for sale at the end of September was 435,000. This represents a supply of 6.9 months at the current sales pace.

    By comparison, there were 1.13 million existing homes for sale at the end of September, or the equivalent of 3.4 months’ supply at the current monthly sales pace.

    Typically, the ratio of existing homes to new homes has been closer to 5 to 1, but lately it has been closer to 2 to 1, according to the National Association of Realtors.

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  • Plunging sales of new homes show China’s real estate crisis isn’t over | CNN Business

    Plunging sales of new homes show China’s real estate crisis isn’t over | CNN Business

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    Hong Kong
    CNN
     — 

    Plunging sales of new homes and the reported cancellation of a share placement by China’s biggest property developer on Tuesday underscored the depth of the country’s real estate crisis.

    Reports that Country Garden had abruptly pulled an attempt to raise $300 million by issuing new shares in Hong Kong coincided with the release of data late Monday showing new home sales by China’s 100 biggest developers dropped by 33% in July from a year ago.

    “No definitive agreement has been entered into with respect to the proposed transaction and the company is not considering the proposed transaction at this stage,” Country Garden said in a statement. Its shares fell as much as 11% on the Hong Kong stock exchange. They were last down 7%.

    The drop in new home sales in China is the steepest monthly decline since July 2022. For the first seven months of this year, new home sales by the 100 developers fell 4.7% from a year earlier.

    “Overall, the current market demand and purchasing power are overdrawn, and industry confidence is still at a low level,” the China Real Estate Information Corp. — a leading industry data provider — said in a statement.

    China’s huge property industry was long an important engine of economic growth, accounting for as much as 30% of the country’s GDP. Investors see the revival of the sector as crucial to the recovery of the world’s second largest economy following three years of self-imposed coronavirus pandemic isolation.

    “Recent signals from top policymakers… suggest Beijing is getting increasingly worried about growth and have clearly recognized the need to bolster the faltering property sector,” said Nomura analysts on Monday.

    “They are starting a new round [of] property easing, and may introduce some stimulus to redevelop old districts of large cities.”

    Premier Li Qiang pledged Monday to “adjust and optimize” policies to ensure the healthy and stable development of the property market, according to a readout from a State Council meeting. Cities should roll out measures that meet their own needs, he added, without elaborating on the details.

    Four of the biggest cities in China said they would introduce measures to boost local property markets, also without announcing specific new policies.

    Shanghai’s housing regulator said Monday it would implement the pledges of the top policymakers. Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Beijing also made similar statements over the weekend.

    “So far these steps are still far from enough to stem the downward spiral of the property sector, in our view,” Nomura analysts said, adding that there is no clear policy roadmap to boost the sector at a time of slow growth in household income, weak confidence about the future and a shrinking population.

    Chinese households have grown reluctant to purchase new homes, as the now-defunct Covid curbs, falling home prices and rising unemployment have discouraged would-be buyers.

    A series of major defaults by property giants in 2021 also undermined confidence in the sector and led to many home buyers paying for apartments they never received, sparking protests.

    As a result China’s property industry has been mired in a historic downturn in the past two years.

    New home prices had fallen for 16 straight months through last December. They stabilized earlier this year, but then resumed their decline in June, highlighting the challenges of reviving demand.

    Last month, the People’s Bank of China said it would give developers another 12 months to repay their outstanding loans due this year.

    And late last year Beijing unveiled a 16-point plan to ease a liquidity crisis in the real estate sector. Key measures include allowing banks to extend maturing loans to developers and boosting other funding channels for property firms.

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  • Housing slump likely to continue but some see hopeful signs ahead | CNN Business

    Housing slump likely to continue but some see hopeful signs ahead | CNN Business

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    A version of this story first appeared in CNN Business’ Before the Bell newsletter. Not a subscriber? You can sign up right here.


    New York
    CNN
     — 

    Mortgage rates have ticked down recently, but are still up dramatically from a year ago thanks to the surge in long-term bond yields as the Federal Reserve hiked interest rates.

    While that’s already had a negative impact on the housing market, we’ll get more details this week about how much worse the damage has become.

    A long list of housing data is on tap. On Tuesday the US Census Bureau will report housing starts and building permits figures for November, followed by Friday’s release of new home sales data for the same month. In between that will be the November existing home sales numbers from the National Association of Realtors on Wednesday, as well as weekly data on mortgage rates and applications on Thursday.

    For the past few months, existing and new home sales have been steadily declining because of the spike in rates and the fact that home prices remain stubbornly high for first-time buyers. Housing starts and building permits have been choppier on a month-to-month basis, but those figures are both down from a year ago.

    Still, there are some promising signs that the worst could soon be over. Shares of Lennar

    (LEN)    , one of the largest homebuilders in the US, rallied after reporting earnings last week. Revenue topped forecasts and the company’s guidance for the number of homes it expected to deliver next year was a little higher than analysts’ estimates as well.

    Lennar investors “may be looking ahead to 2023, perhaps crossing the valley from recession to potential recovery,” according to CFRA Research analyst Kenneth Leon.

    Others in the industry are cautiously optimistic as well.

    According to data from Amherst Group, an investment firm that buys single-family homes to rent out, it’s important to put the recent slide in prices in context.

    Amherst said home prices are still up about 40% from pre-pandemic levels. So even a further drop of about 15% would merely bring them to mid-2021 levels. In other words, this isn’t like the mid-2000s real estate bubble bursting.

    It’s also worth noting that the job market is still strong and wages are growing. What’s more, many consumers still have decent levels of excess savings thanks to pandemic era government stimulus.

    That all amounts to a few good reasons why the housing market could avoid a severe and prolonged slump.

    “The U.S. housing market is still supported by a tight labor market, the lock-in effect of low fixed mortgage rates for existing homeowners, tight mortgage underwriting, low leverage in the mortgage sector, and low housing supply,” said Brandywine fixed-income analyst Tracy Chen in a report this month.

    “We believe we can avoid a severe housing downturn like the one in the Global Financial Crisis,” Chen added.

    Others point out that even though housing sales may remain weak due to high home prices and still elevated mortgage rates, the good news is that most existing homeowners are still paying their monthly mortgage on time.

    Again, that’s a stark contrast from 2008 when many people with subprime loans or borrowers with poor credit histories were unable to keep up with their mortgage payments.

    “Housing is not bringing down the economy. Yes, the housing market has been impacted. But mortgage delinquencies are still low,” said Gene Goldman, chief investment officer at Cetera Investment Management.

    There aren’t a ton of companies reporting their latest earnings this week. But the few that are could give more clues about the financial health of consumers and the state of corporate spending.

    Cereal giant General Mills

    (GIS)     will release earnings on Tuesday. Analysts are expecting a slight increase in both sales and profit. Consumers may be growing increasingly wary about inflation and the broader economy, but they’re still eating their Wheaties. Shares of General Mills

    (GIS)     have soared nearly 30% this year.

    Analysts are less optimistic about the outlooks for sneaker king and Dow component Nike

    (NKE)    , used car retailer CarMax

    (KMX)     and memory chip maker Micron

    (MU)    , whose semiconductors are used in devices ranging from cell phones and computers to cars.

    Earnings are expected to decline for these three companies. They won’t be the only leaders of Corporate America to report weak results.

    According to data from FactSet, fourth-quarter earnings for S&P 500 companies are expected to decline 2.8% from a year ago. Analysts have been busy cutting their forecasts too. John Butters, senior earnings analyst at FactSet, noted in a report that fourth-quarter profits were expected to rise 3.7% as recently as September 30.

    Investors are also going to be paying very close attention to what companies say in their earnings reports about their outlooks for 2023. Analysts currently are anticipating earnings growth of 5.3% for 2023. That could be too optimistic… especially if companies start cutting their own forecasts due to worries about the broader economy.

    “Odds of a recession are pretty high,” said Vincent Reinhart, chief economist and macro strategist at Dreyfus & Mellon. “That will have a knock-on effect for corporate earnings. Higher rates and weaker earnings suggest more pain for stocks.”

    Monday: Germany Ifo business climate index

    Tuesday: US housing starts and building permits; China sets loan prime rate; Bank of Japan interest rate decision; earnings from General Mills, Nike, FedEx

    (FDX)     and Blackberry

    (BB)

    Wednesday: US existing home sales; Germany consumer confidence; earnings from Rite Aid

    (RAD)    , Carnival

    (CCL)    , Cintas

    (CTAS)    , Toro

    (TTC)     and Micron

    Thursday: US weekly jobless claims; US Q3 GDP (third estimate); earnings from CarMax

    (KMX)     and Paychex

    Friday: US personal income and spending; US PCE inflation; US new home sales; US durable goods orders; US U. of Michigan consumer sentiment; Japan inflation; UK markets close early

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  • Sensex, Nifty: Key factors that may influence Dalal Street this week

    Sensex, Nifty: Key factors that may influence Dalal Street this week

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    The coming week is likely to be a volatile one for local equity markets on account of the F&O (Futures and Options) expiry, which is scheduled to take place on November 24, 2022. On the economic data front, market participants will be eyeing foreign exchange reserves data to be out on November 25 for further cues. Foreign exchange reserves in India decreased to $529.990 billion on November 4 from $531.080 billion in the previous week. Meanwhile, the trend in investment by foreign institutional investors and the movement of the rupee against the dollar will also be closely watched by the market participants.

    Dr. Joseph Thomas, Head of Research, Emkay Wealth Management, said: “Markets will look forward to the developments in Europe and the statements from leading Fed officials on the future stance of the Federal Reserves. Though price pressures have ebbed, the retail inflation numbers are too high for the comfort of the central banks, especially in the US and India.”

    At the same time, he further said, the prominent view is that probably inflation has peaked and that central banks might still hike rates but the quantum of hikes would be more moderate. “Some signs of sluggishness in growth could set in soon due to the aggressive rate action in the last few months. Markets would focus on the actual numbers to get a sense of the trajectory of inflation and official policy as well,” Thomas said.

    On the global front, investors would be eyeing a few economic data from the world’s largest economy, the United States (US), starting with Chicago Fed National Activity Index on November 21, Redbook and Fed Mester Speech on November 22, API Crude Oil Stock Change, Initial Jobless Claims, S&P Global Manufacturing PMI, S&P Global Services PMI, S&P Global Composite PMI, New Home Sales, EIA Crude Oil Stocks Change, Baker Hughes Total Rig Count on November 23, and FOMC Minutes on November 24.

    Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial services, said: “During the week, the direction of the domestic market was largely driven by the trend of global peers. Global markets were surging in the expectation that the Fed will scale back its aggressive rate hike in reaction to easing U.S. inflation data. However, the euphoria was dashed by better U.S. retail sales in October and aggressive remarks from Fed officials. Domestic CPI inflation has moderated to 6.8% owing to declines in food and commodity prices, however, it remained above the RBI’s tolerance level. The CPI is estimated to fall within the range from Q1 FY24.”

    “Although domestic macroeconomic indicators and FII inflows are favourable, negative vibes from global markets and premium valuation compared to peers, the domestic market traded with caution. In the absence of major domestic triggers, the domestic market is expected to continue its focus on global trends. Considering the current market scenario, a balanced approach with a mix of equity & debt, 60:40 for an average risk-averse investor, is advised as interest yields are becoming attractive, and the economy is slowing,” Nair added.

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