Housing
The housing read — what high mortgage rates are doing to sales, construction, and prices.
July resales held the year's 4.0–4.2 million band (4.06M) with repeat owner-occupant buyers carrying the pace, while construction shrank: total starts fell 12.4% with the entire annual decline in the South, and single-family fell to 808,000, the lowest since November 2022. New-home sales ran at 607,000 and the unsold pile changed shape — a record 115,000 of the 488,000 homes for sale have not been started, while those under construction fell 8.6% on the year. Because Census counts a new-home sale at contract signing, July is the first month recorded entirely at ~6.5% mortgage rates; the resale test still lands with the Aug/Sep reports.
- August 18, 2026 Builders Started the Fewest Single-Family Homes Since 2022; the Entire Annual Decline in Total Starts Is in the South Housing
July housing starts fell 12.4% to a 1.239 million annual pace, a statistically significant drop that reversed June's all-apartment jump. Single-family starts fell to 808,000 — the lowest since November 2022, down a significant 15.7% on the year. The South accounts for more than the entire annual decline in total starts (−205,000 against −193,000 nationally, the only regional total outside the margin of error) and about two-thirds of the single-family decline — the pullback is concentrated in the oversupplied half of the country. Permits rose 5.0% to 1.443 million while homes authorized but not yet started climbed a significant 10.3% on the year; completions, at 1.212 million, are the lowest since May 2020.
- August 11, 2026 Investors Pulled Back and Repeat Owners Took Their Place Housing
July existing-home sales ran at a 4.06 million annual pace (−1.7% m/m, +0.7% y/y) — a seventh straight month inside 4.01–4.19 million, with June revised up to 4.13 million. Under the flat total the buyer pool shifted: individual investors and second-home buyers fell to 14% of transactions from 20% a year ago, cash to 26% from 31%, leaving repeat owner-occupant buyers at roughly 57% and about three purchases in four carrying a mortgage. The Northeast–South price gap widened to 4.3 points of annual growth. Inventory slipped 0.6% below its year-ago level after going flat in June. The mortgage climb to 6.69% began in early July — after the contracts behind July's closings — so the rate test arrives with the August report on September 10.
- July 24, 2026 The New-Home Discount to Existing Homes Doubled in a Year Housing
June's new-home report was mostly noise — the +1.6% headline sits inside a ±14.8-point interval — with two real signals underneath: the West fell 22.4%, the only statistically significant regional move, and the median new home ($398,300) now sells about 10% below the median existing home ($440,600), a discount that has roughly doubled in a year. Builders who must sell keep cutting; owners who can wait keep setting records.
- July 17, 2026 June's Building Jump Was All Apartments; Single-Family Didn't Move Housing
June housing starts jumped 19.0% to a 1.427 million annual pace, but the entire gain was multifamily — apartment starts rose 76% off a weak May while single-family starts held at 895,000, statistically flat against both May and a year ago. Permits, the forward signal, fell 3.0%. The resale market's sharp North–South split doesn't map onto construction: no region's single-family permits moved outside the survey's margin of error from a year ago. What the levels show is geography — roughly four of every five single-family homes permitted were in the South and West, the oversupplied half; the South permits ten single-family homes for every one the Northeast does. New building can't relieve the starved North and keeps adding supply to the glutted South.
- July 5, 2026 The South Has Homes but Few Buyers; the North Has Buyers but Few Homes Housing
Homes for sale in the 50 largest US metros have split by region — the South and West hold 12% more than before the pandemic, the North 36% fewer. Sellers don't explain it — they list about 18% fewer homes than in 2019 in both regions. Buyers do. In the South, homes under contract are down a fifth from 2019 and listing prices are falling; in the North, homes under contract are up 30% against far fewer listings, and prices hold flat while Southern prices fall.