Housing Sector Is Shining In Murky U.S. Economy Home Depot Comps Soar

A cart-full of good news on Tuesday â€” especially for Home Depot (HD) â€” showed that the housing sector continued to be one of the strongest parts of the economy to start 2016.

Existing-home sales rose to a 5.47 million annual pace, just shy of Julyâ€™s level that was the highest since early 2007,,,

The 1.82 million existing homes available for sale rose 3.4% on the month but were still down 2.2% from a year earlier. That means thereâ€™s just a 4.0-month supply of homes for sale, just above Decemberâ€™s 3.9 months, which was the lowest since January 2005.

Amid tight supplies, buyers bid up the national median home price by 8.2% from a year earlier, the largest gain since April.

The pause in new-order momentum for the luxury home builder coincided with an overall drop in U.S. consumer confidence. The Conference Board said Tuesday that its confidence index fell to 92.2 in February, down 5.6 points to the lowest level since July. The expectations index slipped to its lowest point in two years, as the share of people expecting an income boost declined to 17.2% from 18.6%. Meanwhile, those who expect their incomes to drop rose to 12.5% from 10.7%.

One concern about the housing market is that income gains are running far below the pace of home price increases, which is a negative for demand.

December housing market data from S&P/Case-Shiller showed that national home prices rose 5.4% from a year earlier, up from 5.2% in November. But thereâ€™s tentative evidence that price gains in major cities have stopped accelerating. The 20-city index showed year-over-year price gains holding at 5.7%, while gains in Case-Shillerâ€™s 10-city index slowed to 5.1% from 5.2%.

Good morning all! Yesterday stock indexes got a percent hit in soft trade as the upside ceiling holds solid. So much so that this morning's index futures are down for another percent today. They say metals look good tho, gold seems to like it's new $1,200 floor.

Today we'll see how this morning's MBA Mortgage Index, New Home Sales, and Crude Inventories end up

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HOORAY Home Depot!

BOL! Years ago, my wife and her friends did not want their husbands to go to Home Depot by ourselves.

Now, the husbands are afraid for our wives to go shopping in Home Depot by themselves.

My wife carries a copy of my DD214 in her purse, to get a 10% veterans discount.

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