More housing news is ahead, starting with Tuesday’s release of home price appreciation data for January from the Case-Shiller Home Price Index and the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) House Price Index. Pending Home Sales for February will be reported on Wednesday.

Look for the latest Jobless Claims data along with the final reading for fourth quarter 2022 GDP on Thursday. Friday brings February’s reading for the Fed’s favored inflation measure, Personal Consumption Expenditures.

REMEMBER: News about improvement to inflation will lead to lowered mortgage rates and increased demand.

February’s data showed signs of strength in the housing market, despite media headlines to the contrary. For example, while there was a 0.2% decline in the median home price to $363,000 from a year earlier, this is not the same as a decline in home prices as some reports implied.

The median home price simply means half the homes sold were above that price and half were below it, and this figure can be skewed by the mix of sales among lower-priced and higher-priced homes. Real appreciation data per the latest Case-Shiller Home Price Index showed that home prices were 5.8% higher than a year earlier.

In addition, there were 980,000 homes available for sale at the end of February, up from 850,000 a year earlier. However, this inventory increase is from a record low level and overall, supply is still much lower than in a balanced market.

Homes stayed on the market on average for 34 days, while 57% of homes sold in February were on the market for less than a month, which also speaks to continued demand for homes. NAR’s Chief Economist Lawrence Yun noted that, “Inventory levels are still at historic lows. Consequently, multiple offers are returning on a good number of properties."

Article Written and Provided by Padi Goodspeed, SVP at Cross Country Mortgage