Housing Starts down.

Housing Starts (August 2014)

– Housing Starts seasonally adjusted, annualized 956,000. Previous was 1,117,000

– Permits seasonally adjusted, annualized 998,000. Previous was 1,057,000.

This indicates that the momentum housing was gaining is not sustaining.  The underlying fact is that not enough people are getting jobs with income high enough to support homeownership.

To keep pace with population growth and assuming that the number of people per household remains constant we should have 1,500,000 Starts per year.

Housing is also restrained by the tougher mortgage lending standards imposed by CFPB.  No one in D.C. seems to yet recognized that regulation almost always comes with adverse consequences.

 

Jobless Claims (week ended 9/13/2014)

– New Claims 280,000. Previous was 316,000

– 4-week Moving Average 299,500. Previous was 394,250.

This part of the jobs market indicates health but, as I discuss in my monthly analysis of the BLS Employment Situation Report, layoffs are only about 10% of the dynamics of the jobs market.

 

Philadelphia Federal Reserve Survey   (September 2014)

– General Business Conditions 22.5. Previous was 28.00.