Bad.
And prices down again.

As previously discussed, with mtg purchase apps down and cash buyers down it’s hard to see how sales can rise…

Existing Home Sales
Existing-home-sales-nov
Highlights
Existing home sales had been showing some life but not in November, sinking a very steep 6.1 percent to a 4.93 million annual rate which is below the low end of the Econoday consensus (4.97 million to 5.35 million). November, a month when the nation’s weather proved mostly mild and which should have given a boost to sales, ends 5 straight months of plus 5.0 million rates.

November’s weakness is broad based with all 4 regions showing single digit monthly declines. But the good news is that the weakness in sales is not inflating supply which, due to a draw down of homes on the market to 2.09 million from 2.24 million, held steady relative to sales, at 5.1 months.

Lower prices don’t seem to be giving a boost to sales. The median fell for a 5th straight month, down 1.1 percent in November to $205,300. Year-on-year the median price, where growth had been in the double digits through most of last year, is up 5.5 percent, holding in the mid-single digit area where it’s been since March.

Existing Home Sales in November: 4.93 million SAAR, Inventory up 2.0% Year-over-year

By Bill McBride

Existing-home-sales-nov-graph

A bit of a blip up in manufacturing, the rest not good:

Chicago Fed National Activity Index
chi-fed
Highlights
The big 1.1 percent jump in the manufacturing component of the industrial production fed a very strong plus 0.73 percent reading for November’s national activity index vs a revised plus 0.31 in October. Other components in November, however, were flat with the positive contribution from employment edging lower while the positive contribution from sales/orders/inventories all but disappeared. The drag from consumption & housing remained moderate. The outsized manufacturing gain also boosted the 3-month average which rose to plus 0.48 in November from October’s revised plus 0.09 for its strongest reading since May 2010.
chicago-fed-graph-1