Home Prices Flat, Consumer Confidence Down Sharply

Here’s a recap of today’s data. More comments on home prices coming shortly.

S&P Case-Shiller Home Price Index (March 2012)
– 20-city, Seasonally Adjusted, Month/Month +0.1%. Previous was +0.2%
– 20-city, Not Seasonally Adjusted, Month/Month 0.0%. Previous was -0.8%
– 20-city, Not Seasonally Adjusted, Year/Year -2.6 %. Previous was -3.5%

Home prices are the lowest they have been since the middle of 2002.

While the data is extremely flat, the fact that home prices are not falling constitutes good news at present. Housing is local and we have places such as Phoenix where values have rebounded nicely and places such as Atlanta, Chicago, Las Vegas, New York and Portland where they hit new post-bubble lows.

Consumer Confidence (May 2012)
Consumer Confidence for May 2012 slipped a ton from 68.7 to 64.9. This is ugly.

Dallas Federal Reserve Manufacturing Index (May 2012)
– Index is -5.1 after a -3.4 for April.