{"id":2776,"date":"2021-01-25T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-01-25T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/?p=2776"},"modified":"2022-04-02T14:52:40","modified_gmt":"2022-04-02T14:52:40","slug":"december-2020-home-sales","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/2021\/01\/25\/december-2020-home-sales\/","title":{"rendered":"December 2020 Home Sales Remained Strong"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Wrapping up last year, December 2020 home sales remained strong. After a relatively uneventful week for mortgage markets, rates ended slightly lower. However, mortgage rate levels were still a bit above the record-low levels seen late in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

December 2020 Home Sales Update<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The housing sector suffered in the spring of 2020. This is mainly attributed to the partial economic shutdown. However, the spectacular housing market rebound continued.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Existing December 2020 home sales unexpectedly increased from November. They were also 22% higher than the numbers in 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking at the full year, 2020 saw the strongest sales pace since 2006. As a result, the median existing-home price was 13% higher than a year ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"december<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

2021 Housing Inventory Levels<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Although December 2020 home sales remained strong, housing inventory levels declined 23% from the previous year. In the process, December 2020 housing inventory levels hit record lows. To date, they remain the primary obstacle to even stronger sales activity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Overall, homes for sale were at just a 1.9-month supply nationally. Unfortunately, this is well below the 6.0-month supply (which is considered a healthy balance between buyers and sellers).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Latest on Housing Starts<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Encouragingly, Thursday’s report on December 2020 housing starts contained optimistic news. In December, single-family housing starts unexpectedly rose 12% from November. Concurrently, they were 28% higher than a year ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

December was the eighth straight month of housing starts gains. Similarly, single-family building permits increased 8% from November. They were also 30% higher than a year ago. In general, single-family permits are a leading indicator for future construction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

European Central Bank Update<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The European Central Bank (ECB) made no policy changes at Thursday’s meeting and repeated that its massive bond purchase program will run until at least March 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The meeting statement said that the ECB “decided to reconfirm its very accommodative monetary policy stance.”<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking Ahead After December 2020 Home Sales<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

December 2020 home sales represent a positive outcome for the United States economy. Looking ahead, investors will continue watching COVID-19 case counts and vaccine distribution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, Fed officials emphasized there will not be rate hikes in the near future. Therefore, investors are looking for guidance on the Fed’s inflation outlook and its bond purchase program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyond that, fourth-quarter GDP data will be released on Thursday. GDP is considered the broadest measure of economic activity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The core PCE price index, the inflation indicator favored by the Fed, will come out on Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Never miss an update with MBSQuoteline. To receive by-the-minute updates on mortgage-backed securities, try our platform free for 14 days.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"december<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Stay connected with MBSQuoteline on social media by following us on Facebook<\/a> and LinkedIn<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All material Copyright \u00a9 Ress No. 1, LTD (DBA MBSQuoteline) and may not be reproduced without permission. To learn more about the MortgageTime\u2122 newsletter, please contact MBSQuoteline at 800.627.1077<\/a> or info@mbsquoteline.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wrapping up last year, December 2020 home sales remained strong. Mortgage rates ended slightly lower after an uneventful week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":2778,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[426],"tags":[443,368],"class_list":["post-2776","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mortgagetime","tag-housing-inventory","tag-housing-starts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2776","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2776"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2776\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2786,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2776\/revisions\/2786"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2776"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2776"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mbsquoteline.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}