by Calculated Risk on 4/19/2021 10:42:00 AM

One of the key questions for 2021 is: Will inventory increase as the pandemic subsides, or will inventory decrease further in 2021?

Tracking inventory will be very important this year.

Click on graph for larger image in graph gallery.

This inventory graph is courtesy of Altos Research.

As of April 16th, inventory was at 312 thousand (7 day average), compared to 749 thousand the same week a year ago.  That is a decline of 58%.

A week ago, inventory was at 307 thousand, and was down 59% YoY.  Seasonally, inventory might have bottomed.

Mike Simonsen discusses this data regularly on Youtube.

by Calculated Risk on 4/19/2021 08:11:00 AM

These indicators are mostly for travel and entertainment.    It will interesting to watch these sectors recover as the vaccine is distributed.   

IMPORTANT: Be safe now - if all goes well, we could all be vaccinated by June.

----- Airlines: Transportation Security Administration -----
The TSA is providing daily travel numbers.

Click on graph for larger image.

This data shows the seven day average of daily total traveler throughput from the TSA for 2019 (Light Blue), 2020 (Blue) and 2021 (Red).

The dashed line is the percent of 2019 for the seven day average.

This data is as of April 18th.

The seven day average is down 42.1% from the same day in 2019 (57.9% of last year).  (Dashed line)

There was a slow increase from the bottom, with ups and downs due to the holidays - and TSA data has picked up in 2021, but down over the last week.

----- Restaurants: OpenTable -----
The second graph shows the 7 day average of the year-over-year change in diners as tabulated by OpenTable for the US and several selected cities.

IMPORTANT: OpenTable notes: "we’ve updated the data including downloadable dataset from January 1, 2021 onward to compare seated diners from 2021 to 2019, as opposed to year over year." Thanks!

Thanks to OpenTable for providing this restaurant data:

This data is updated through April 17, 2021.

This data is "a sample of restaurants on the OpenTable network across all channels: online reservations, phone reservations, and walk-ins. For year-over-year comparisons by day, we compare to the same day of the week from the same week in the previous year."

Note that this data is for "only the restaurants that have chosen to reopen in a given market". Since some restaurants have not reopened, the actual year-over-year decline is worse than shown.

Dining picked up during the holidays, then slumped with the huge winter surge in cases.  Dining was picking up again, but turned down last week.

----- Movie Tickets: Box Office Mojo -----
This data shows domestic box office for each week and the median for the years 2016 through 2019 (dashed light blue).  

Blue is 2020 and Red is 2021.  

The data is from BoxOfficeMojo through Apr 15th.

Note that the data is usually noisy week-to-week and depends on when blockbusters are released.

Movie ticket sales were at $33 million last week,  down about 75% from the median for the week.

----- Hotel Occupancy: STR -----
This graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four week average.

The red line is for 2021, black is 2020, blue is the median, and dashed light blue is for 2009 (the worst year since the Great Depression for hotels - before 2020).

Occupancy is now above the horrible 2009 levels.

This data is through April 10th. Hotel occupancy is currently down 15% compared to same week in 2019). Note: Occupancy was up year-over-year, since occupancy declined sharply at the onset of the pandemic. However, occupancy is still down significantly from normal levels.

Notes: Y-axis doesn't start at zero to better show the seasonal change.

----- Gasoline Supplied: Energy Information Administration -----
This graph, based on weekly data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), shows gasoline supplied compared to the same week of 2019.

Blue is for 2020.  Red is for 2021.

As of April 9th, gasoline supplied was off about 5.1% (about 94.9% of the same week in 2019).

Gasoline supplied was up year-over-year, since at one point, gasoline supplied was off almost 50% YoY in 2020.

----- Transit: Apple Mobility -----
This graph is from Apple mobility. From Apple: "This data is generated by counting the number of requests made to Apple Maps for directions in select countries/regions, sub-regions, and cities." This is just a general guide - people that regularly commute probably don't ask for directions.

There is also some great data on mobility from the Dallas Fed Mobility and Engagement Index. However the index is set "relative to its weekday-specific average over January–February", and is not seasonally adjusted, so we can't tell if an increase in mobility is due to recovery or just the normal increase in the Spring and Summer.

This data is through April 17th for the United States and several selected cities.

The graph is the running 7 day average to remove the impact of weekends.

IMPORTANT: All data is relative to January 13, 2020. This data is NOT Seasonally Adjusted. People walk and drive more when the weather is nice, so I'm just using the transit data.

According to the Apple data directions requests, public transit in the 7 day average for the US is at 66% of the January 2020 level. It is at 62% in Chicago, and 61% in Houston (the Houston dip was a weather related decline) - and moving up recently.

----- New York City Subway Usage -----
Here is some interesting data on New York subway usage (HT BR).

This graph is from Todd W Schneider. This is weekly data since 2015. 

Most weeks are between 30 and 35 million entries, and currently there just above 10 million subway turnstile entries per week.

This data is through Friday, April 16th.

Schneider has graphs for each borough, and links to all the data sources.

He notes: "Data updates weekly from the MTA’s public turnstile data, usually on Saturday mornings".

by Calculated Risk on 4/18/2021 07:38:00 PM

Weekend:
• Schedule for Week of April 18, 2021

Monday:
• No major economic releases scheduled.

From CNBC: Pre-Market Data and Bloomberg futures S&P 500 futures are down 10 and DOW futures are down 75 (fair value).

Oil prices were up over the last week with WTI futures at $62.88 per barrel and Brent at $66.49 per barrel. A year ago, WTI were below zero, and Brent was at $17 - so WTI oil prices are UP sharply year-over-year (oil prices collapsed at the beginning of the pandemic).

Here is a graph from Gasbuddy.com for nationwide gasoline prices. Nationally prices are at $2.85 per gallon. A year ago prices were at $1.77 per gallon, so gasoline prices are up $1.08 per gallon year-over-year.

by Calculated Risk on 4/18/2021 04:26:00 PM

Note: I'm looking forward to not posting this daily! I've been posting this data daily for over a year, and I'll stop once all three of these criteria are met:
1) 70% of the population over 18 has had at least one dose of vaccine,
2) new cases are under 5,000 per day, and
3) hospitalizations are below 3,000.

According to the CDC, 209.4 million doses have been administered. 32.5% of the population over 18 is fully vaccinated, and 50.4% of the population over 18 has had at least one dose (130.0 million people over 18 have had at least one dose).

And check out COVID Act Now to see how each state is doing. 

Almost 12,000 US deaths were reported so far in April due to COVID.

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows the daily (columns) 7 day average (line) of positive tests reported.

Note: The ups and downs during the Winter surge were related to reporting delays due to the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays.

This data is from the CDC.

The 7-day average is 67,442, down from 68,509 yesterday, but above the summer surge peak of 67,337 on July 23, 2020.

The second graph shows the number of people hospitalized.

This data is also from the CDC.

The CDC cautions that due to reporting delays, the area in grey will probably increase.

The current 7-day average is 36,976, down from 37,339 reported yesterday, and well above the post-summer surge low of 23,000.

by Calculated Risk on 4/18/2021 01:36:00 PM

Housing economist Tom Lawler has been sending me his predictions of what the NAR will report for  11 years.  And he has graciously allowed me to share his predictions with the readers of this blog.

The table below shows the consensus for each month, Lawler's predictions, and the NAR's initially reported level of sales. 

Lawler hasn't always been closer than the consensus, but usually when there has been a fairly large spread between Lawler's estimate and the "consensus", Lawler has been closer.

For example, last month Lawler estimated the NAR would report sales of 6.29 million SAAR, the consensus was 6.51 million SAAR, and the NAR reported 6.22 million SAAR.

The NAR is scheduled to release Existing Home Sales for March at 10:00 AM, Thursday, April 22nd.

The consensus is for 6.17 million SAAR in March, down from 6.22 million in Febuary. Tom Lawler estimates the NAR will report sales of 6.02 million SAAR. Based on Lawler's estimate, I expect existing home sales to be below the consensus in March.

NOTE: There have been times when Lawler "missed", but then he pointed out an apparent error in the NAR data - and the subsequent revision corrected that error.  As an example, see: The “Curious Case” of Existing Home Sales in the South in April

Over the last 11 years, the consensus average miss was 147 thousand, and  Lawler's average miss was 73 thousand.

Existing Home Sales, Forecasts and NAR Report millions, seasonally adjusted annual rate basis (SAAR)
Month	Consensus	Lawler	NAR reported1
May-10	6.20	5.83	5.66
Jun-10	5.30	5.30	5.37
Jul-10	4.66	3.95	3.83
Aug-10	4.10	4.10	4.13
Sep-10	4.30	4.50	4.53
Oct-10	4.50	4.46	4.43
Nov-10	4.85	4.61	4.68
Dec-10	4.90	5.13	5.28
Jan-11	5.20	5.17	5.36
Feb-11	5.15	5.00	4.88
Mar-11	5.00	5.08	5.10
Apr-11	5.20	5.15	5.05
May-11	4.75	4.80	4.81
Jun-11	4.90	4.71	4.77
Jul-11	4.92	4.69	4.67
Aug-11	4.75	4.92	5.03
Sep-11	4.93	4.83	4.91
Oct-11	4.80	4.86	4.97
Nov-11	5.08	4.40	4.42
Dec-11	4.60	4.64	4.61
Jan-12	4.69	4.66	4.57
Feb-12	4.61	4.63	4.59
Mar-12	4.62	4.59	4.48
Apr-12	4.66	4.53	4.62
May-12	4.57	4.66	4.55
Jun-12	4.65	4.56	4.37
Jul-12	4.50	4.47	4.47
Aug-12	4.55	4.87	4.82
Sep-12	4.75	4.70	4.75
Oct-12	4.74	4.84	4.79
Nov-12	4.90	5.10	5.04
Dec-12	5.10	4.97	4.94
Jan-13	4.90	4.94	4.92
Feb-13	5.01	4.87	4.98
Mar-13	5.03	4.89	4.92
Apr-13	4.92	5.03	4.97
May-13	5.00	5.20	5.18
Jun-13	5.27	4.99	5.08
Jul-13	5.13	5.33	5.39
Aug-13	5.25	5.35	5.48
Sep-13	5.30	5.26	5.29
Oct-13	5.13	5.08	5.12
Nov-13	5.02	4.98	4.90
Dec-13	4.90	4.96	4.87
Jan-14	4.70	4.67	4.62
Feb-14	4.64	4.60	4.60
Mar-14	4.56	4.64	4.59
Apr-14	4.67	4.70	4.65
May-14	4.75	4.81	4.89
Jun-14	4.99	4.96	5.04
Jul-14	5.00	5.09	5.15
Aug-14	5.18	5.12	5.05
Sep-14	5.09	5.14	5.17
Oct-14	5.15	5.28	5.26
Nov-14	5.20	4.90	4.93
Dec-14	5.05	5.15	5.04
Jan-15	5.00	4.90	4.82
Feb-15	4.94	4.87	4.88
Mar-15	5.04	5.18	5.19
Apr-15	5.22	5.20	5.04
May-15	5.25	5.29	5.35
Jun-15	5.40	5.45	5.49
Jul-15	5.41	5.64	5.59
Aug-15	5.50	5.54	5.31
Sep-15	5.35	5.56	5.55
Oct-15	5.41	5.33	5.36
Nov-15	5.32	4.97	4.76
Dec-15	5.19	5.36	5.46
Jan-16	5.32	5.36	5.47
Feb-16	5.30	5.20	5.08
Mar-16	5.27	5.27	5.33
Apr-16	5.40	5.44	5.45
May-16	5.64	5.55	5.53
Jun-16	5.48	5.62	5.57
Jul-16	5.52	5.41	5.39
Aug-16	5.44	5.49	5.33
Sep-16	5.35	5.55	5.47
Oct-16	5.44	5.47	5.60
Nov-16	5.54	5.60	5.61
Dec-16	5.54	5.55	5.49
Jan-17	5.55	5.60	5.69
Feb-17	5.55	5.41	5.48
Mar-17	5.61	5.74	5.71
Apr-17	5.67	5.56	5.57
May-17	5.55	5.65	5.62
Jun-17	5.58	5.59	5.52
Jul-17	5.57	5.38	5.44
Aug-17	5.48	5.39	5.35
Sep-17	5.30	5.38	5.39
Oct-17	5.30	5.60	5.48
Nov-17	5.52	5.77	5.81
Dec-17	5.75	5.66	5.57
Jan-18	5.65	5.48	5.38
Feb-18	5.42	5.44	5.54
Mar-18	5.28	5.51	5.60
Apr-18	5.60	5.48	5.46
May-18	5.56	5.47	5.43
Jun-18	5.45	5.35	5.38
Jul-18	5.43	5.40	5.34
Aug-18	5.36	5.36	5.34
Sep-18	5.30	5.20	5.15
Oct-18	5.20	5.31	5.22
Nov-18	5.19	5.23	5.32
Dec-18	5.24	4.97	4.99
Jan-19	5.05	4.92	4.94
Feb-19	5.08	5.46	5.51
Mar-19	5.30	5.40	5.21
Apr-19	5.36	5.31	5.19
May-19	5.29	5.40	5.34
Jun-19	5.34	5.25	5.27
Jul-19	5.39	5.40	5.42
Aug-19	5.38	5.42	5.49
Sep-19	5.45	5.36	5.38
Oct-19	5.49	5.36	5.46
Nov-19	5.45	5.43	5.35
Dec-19	5.43	5.40	5.54
Jan-20	5.45	5.42	5.46
Feb-20	5.50	5.58	5.77
Mar-20	5.30	5.25	5.27
Apr-20	4.30	4.17	4.33
May-20	4.38	3.80	3.91
Jun-20	4.86	4.65	4.72
Jul-20	5.39	5.85	5.86
Aug-20	6.00	5.92	6.00
Sep-20	6.25	6.38	6.54
Oct-20	6.45	6.63	6.85
Nov-20	6.70	6.50	6.69
Dec-20	6.55	6.62	6.76
Jan-20	6.60	6.48	6.69
Feb-20	6.51	6.29	6.22
Mar-20	6.17	6.02	NA
1NAR initially reported before revisions.

by Calculated Risk on 4/17/2021 07:29:00 PM

Note: I'm looking forward to not posting this daily! I've been posting this data daily for over a year, and I'll stop once all three of these criteria are met:
1) 70% of the population over 18 has had at least one dose of vaccine,
2) new cases are under 5,000 per day, and
3) hospitalizations are below 3,000.

According to the CDC, 205.9 million doses have been administered. 31.8% of the population over 18 is fully vaccinated, and 49.7% of the population over 18 has had at least one dose (128.3 million people over 18 have had at least one dose).

And check out COVID Act Now to see how each state is doing. 

Over 11,000 US deaths were reported so far in April due to COVID.

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows the daily (columns) 7 day average (line) of positive tests reported.

Note: The ups and downs during the Winter surge were related to reporting delays due to the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays.

This data is from the CDC.

The 7-day average is 68509, down from 69182 yesterday, but above the summer surge peak of 67,337 on July 23, 2020.

The second graph shows the number of people hospitalized.

This data is also from the CDC.

The CDC cautions that due to reporting delays, the area in grey will probably increase.

The current 7-day average is 37,339, up from 37,246 reported yesterday, and well above the post-summer surge low of 23,000.

by Calculated Risk on 4/17/2021 08:11:00 AM

The key reports this week are March New and Existing Home Sales.

For manufacturing, the April Kansas City manufacturing survey will be released.

----- Monday, Apr 19th -----
No major economic releases scheduled.

----- Tuesday, Apr 20th -----
No major economic releases scheduled.

----- Wednesday, Apr 21st -----
7:00 AM ET: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

During the day: The AIA's Architecture Billings Index for March (a leading indicator for commercial real estate).

----- Thursday, Apr 22nd -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released.  The consensus is for a increase to 625 thousand from 576 thousand last week.

8:30 AM ET: Chicago Fed National Activity Index for March. This is a composite index of other data.

10:00 AM: Existing Home Sales for March from the National Association of Realtors (NAR). The consensus is for 6.17 million SAAR, down from 6.22 million.

The graph shows existing home sales from 1994 through the report last month.

Housing economist Tom Lawler expects the NAR to report sales of 6.02 million SAAR for March.

11:00 AM: the Kansas City Fed manufacturing survey for April.

----- Friday, Apr 23rd -----
10:00 AM: New Home Sales for March from the Census Bureau.

This graph shows New Home Sales since 1963. The dashed line is the sales rate for last month.

The consensus is for 885 thousand SAAR, up from 775 thousand in February.

by Calculated Risk on 4/16/2021 04:25:00 PM

From housing economist Tom Lawler:

Based on publicly-available local realtor/MLS reports released across the country through today, I project that existing home sales as estimated by the National Association of Realtors ran at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.02 million in March, down 3.2% from February’s preliminary pace but up 12.5% from last March’s seasonally adjusted pace.

Local realtor reports, as well as reports from national inventory trackers, suggest that the YOY decline in the inventory of existing homes for sale last month was greater than the big decline in February.

One moderately interesting thing to note is that most realtors that break out sales by type showed substantially larger YOY increases in condo sales than in SF detached sales.

Finally, local realtor/MLS data suggest that the median existing single-family home sales price last month was up by about 15.5% from last March.

CR Note: The National Association of Realtors (NAR) is scheduled to release March existing home sales on Thursday, April 22, 2021 at 10:00 AM ET. The consensus is for 6.17 million SAAR.

by Calculated Risk on 4/16/2021 03:48:00 PM

Note: I'm looking forward to not posting this daily! I've been posting this data daily for over a year, and I'll stop once all three of these criteria are met:
1) 70% of the population over 18 has had at least one dose of vaccine,
2) new cases are under 5,000 per day, and
3) hospitalizations are below 3,000.

According to the CDC, 202.3 million doses have been administered. 31.1% of the population over 18 is fully vaccinated, and 49.1% of the population over 18 has had at least one dose (126.6 million people over 18 have had at least one dose).

And check out COVID Act Now to see how each state is doing. 

Over 10,000 US deaths were reported so far in April due to COVID.

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows the daily (columns) 7 day average (line) of positive tests reported.

Note: The ups and downs during the Winter surge were related to reporting delays due to the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays.

This data is from the CDC.

The 7-day average is 69,405, down from 69,577 yesterday, and above the summer surge peak of 67,337 on July 23, 2020.

The second graph shows the number of people hospitalized.

This data is also from the CDC.

The CDC cautions that due to reporting delays, the area in grey will probably increase.

The current 7-day average is 37,246, up from 37,125 reported yesterday, and well above the post-summer surge low of 23,000.

by Calculated Risk on 4/16/2021 12:41:00 PM

The CAR reported: California median home price reaches new all-time high in March as nearly two-thirds of homes sell above asking price, C.A.R. reports

Fierce competition drove California’s median home price to reach a new record high in March, while the state’s housing market continued its momentum with sales remaining solid heading into the spring homebuying season, the CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® (C.A.R.) said today.

Closed escrow sales of existing, single-family detached homes in California totaled a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 462,720 in February, according to information collected by C.A.R. from more than 90 local REALTOR® associations and MLSs statewide. The statewide annualized sales figure represents what would be the total number of homes sold during 2021 if sales maintained the February pace throughout the year. It is adjusted to account for seasonal factors that typically influence home sales.

Closed escrow sales of existing, single-family detached homes in California totaled a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 446,410 in March, according to information collected by C.A.R. from more than 90 local REALTOR® associations and MLSs statewide. The statewide annualized sales figure represents what would be the total number of homes sold during 2021 if sales maintained the March pace throughout the year. It is adjusted to account for seasonal factors that typically influence home sales.

March home sales decreased 3.5 percent from 462,720 in February and were up 19.7 percent from a year ago, when 373,070 homes were sold on an annualized basis. While still solid, the monthly sales decline was the third in a row, and the sales pace was the lowest since last July. The near-20 percent sales gain can be attributed partly to weak home sales a year ago as the Coronavirus outbreak abruptly halted the real estate market and economy.

“While intense homebuying interest is the engine that continues to drive housing demand, a shortage of homes for sales is the rocket fuel pushing prices higher across the state. A lack of homes for sale is creating unprecedented market competition, leading to a record share of homes selling above asking price in March,” said C.A.R. President Dave Walsh, vice president and manager of the Compass San Jose office. “With more of the state’s COVID-19 restrictions being lifted in the coming months as we move into the spring home buying season, we should see home sales improve as more prospective home sellers feel comfortable listing their homes for sale.”
...
The Unsold Inventory Index (UII) dropped to 1.6 months in March from 2.0 months in February and was down sharply from a year ago, when there was 2.7 months of housing inventory. The index indicates the number of months it would take to sell the supply of homes on the market at the current rate of sales.

Active listings fell 51.1 percent in March from last year — the third consecutive month that listings declined more than 50 percent. On a month-to-month basis, for-sale properties inched up by 5.3 percent in March and should climb further in the coming months as the market moves into the spring homebuying season, while the economy continues to improve.
emphasis added

CR Note: Existing home sales are reported when the transaction closes, so this was mostly for contracts signed in January and February.