The peak season of home purchases in the United States cannot "get off to a good start." sales of existing homes fell in April from a year earlier, the longest since the financial crisis.

SMM News: about 90% of the country's housing sales continue to exceed expectations, the U. S. housing market in the spring of this year's traditional home buying "peak season" did not get off to a good start.

On Tuesday, May 21, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR), the total number of existing home sales in the United States in April was 5.19 million, below expectations of 5.35 million and 5.21 million before March, continuing to fall from the 11-month high set in February.

The total number of existing home sales fell 0.4% in April from a month earlier, and the market is expected to increase by 2.7%, compared with a 4.9% month-on-month decline. The figure fell 4.4% in April from a year earlier, the 14th consecutive month of year-on-year decline, according to financial blog Zerohedge, the longest period of decline since the U. S. housing crisis a decade ago.

Wall Street has mentioned that sales of existing homes, the main force in the US housing market, have fluctuated significantly since the end of last year. The number of sales in December 2018 and January 2019 both hit the lowest level since November 2015, and sales in January this year were below 5 million for the first time in more than three years. But February sales of 5.48 million households reached their highest level since March 2018 and rose 11.2 per cent in February from a month earlier, the biggest increase since 2015.

In terms of prices, the median price of existing homes in the US rose 3.6 per cent in April from a year earlier to $267300, the highest since July 2018 and has recorded year-on-year increases for 86 months in a row, compared with a month-on-month increase of 3 per cent. According to analysis, the median increase in the price of existing homes in the United States has gradually narrowed since last summer, with an increase of 2.8% in January, the smallest since February 2012.

Itemized data:

Of the four geographical divisions in the US, only existing home sales in the western region rose 1.8 per cent from a month earlier, up 1.8 per cent to 1.11 million, but down 5.9 per cent from a year earlier; median house prices in the western region were $395100, up 1.3 per cent from a year earlier.

In addition, sales in the north-east fell 4.5 per cent from a month earlier to 640000, with median house prices up 0.9 per cent from a year earlier to $277700. Sales in the Midwest were flat from a month earlier, but fell 7.9 per cent from a year earlier, with median house prices up 5.5 per cent from a year earlier to $210500. Sales in the south fell 0.4 per cent from a month earlier to 2.27 million, down 1.7 per cent from a year earlier, and median house prices were $236800, up 4.4 per cent from a year earlier.

A total of 1.83 million existing homes, or second-hand homes in the US, went on sale in April, up 1.7 per cent from a year earlier, up from 1.68 million in March.

At the current rate of sales, existing home inventories will be sold out in 4.2 months, the highest since October 2018. The market generally believes that inventory sales for less than five months belong to "supply-side tightening", and 6 to 7 months belong to "healthy balance of market supply and demand".

However, the average number of days available for sale in April was 24 days, down from 36 days in March and 26 days in the same period last year. More than half of the homes sold less than a month after they went on sale, indicating that the demand side of the existing housing market in the United States is still strong, while inventories for sale have rebounded.

Observation shows that this year, the Federal Reserve suspended interest rate increases, leading to the decline in U. S. housing mortgage rates; In the week of march 28, the average interest rate on 30-year fixed mortgages fell by 22 basis points to 4.06%, the biggest weekly drop in a decade. The combination of a strong labour market and wage growth, as well as a slowdown in house prices, should be better than the US housing market. But as of April, sales of existing homes were down for the fifth time in six months.

Lawrence Yun, chief economist of NAR, said he was not worried about the downturn in the US existing housing market because the situation was more favourable to buyers, mortgage rates were at historically low levels, jobs continued to grow and wages rose in line with house price increases. Can trigger more existing home sales. As inventories of homes for sale improve, sellers must realize that price increases have moderated, which is the current reality.

CNBC, the financial media, said sales of existing homes fell above expectations in April, mainly due to higher home prices and tighter supply in the lower end of the market, continuing to dampen demand from buyers, especially first suite buyers. Earlier, analysts said many people suspended home purchases at the beginning of the year in the hope of waiting for more appropriate mortgage rates in the United States.

After the release of the data, the dollar index rose slightly narrowed, immediately recovered the decline brought about by the data, standing above the 98 mark, close to a five-month high.

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