Existing Home Sales Off 9.6% in Feb + 4 percent drop in prices from last year = Prices and Sales of Existing Homes Fell Sharply in Feb

[mEDITate-OR:
not SEE why this is such bad news...
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Today NAR released their take on existing home sales.
As you can see from the charts, this looks very different depending on when the chart begins and how many years they show.
What they all show however is that sales dropped, inventories rose and prices dropped.
What they do not show is the fact that interest rates dropped for the last three weeks.
So, that means that new buyers are waiting for the prices to fall, which they are doing, before they buy. Unless they must.
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Prices and Sales of Existing Homes Fell Sharply in February

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/22/business/22econ.html?src=busln

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Existing Home Sales Off 9.6% in February

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/03/existing-home-sales-off-96-in-february/72784/

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US existing home sales down 3 percent from last year

US existing home sales numbers for February show a 9.6 percent decline from the previous month and a 4 percent drop in prices from last year.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Paper-Economy/2011/0321/US-existing-home-sales-down-3-percent-from-last-year

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February Existing-Home Sales Decline following Sustained Gains

http://www.realtor.org/press_room/news_releases/2011/03/feb_decline

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State by State Estimate of Shadow Inventory

[mEDITate-OR:
know that something is missing...
but not know where they are hiding it.
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The NAR has just released their "estimate" of the size & location of the "shadow inventory".
The 1st map/chart shows U.S. how large the foreclosure sales are in each state.
The 2nd lists the states with the largest shadow inventory.
The 3rd lists the states with the smallest shadow inventory.
The 4th map/chart shows U.S. the estimate time in months to clear the shadow inventory at current sales levels.
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There a number of problems with this NAR estimate. First, they cannot be counting/including the pending foreclosures in this list. Second, this look more like it is being taken from their "listings" and does not include all of the REO properties that are being held back.
But, an NAR "guesstimate" is better than nothing.
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State by State Estimate of Shadow Inventory
http://economistsoutlook.blogs.realtor.org/2011/03/21/state-by-state-estimate-of-shadow-inventory/
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