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Case-Shiller Shows Housing Market Heating Up

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Tuesday, March 28, 2017

The Dow Jones Industrial Average looks to break an 8-day losing streak, the index’s longest since 2011. Dow futures are down in today’s pre-market, however, and 9 straight days to the negative would be the longest such streak in 39 years. We happen to be in a slow period for economic data currently, so what might help push the Dow back into positive territory today?

January Case-Shiller numbers were released before the bell today, and single-family homes were reported to have risen 5.9% year over year. This speaks to a continually heating housing market in the U.S., especially considering analysts had been predicting 5.6% growth.

Since bottoming out in 2012 — following the index peak in the summer of 2006 — the Case-Shiller Composite 20 City Index has been on pretty much a steady incline. From South Florida to Seattle, San Diego to Boston, the 20-city index produces comprehensive, steady data (not subject to big revisions, generally) of re-sold single-family homes. The report is produced quarterly, however, which means it posts data that lags month-to-month housing reads.

That said, the Case-Shiller Index is considered the gold standard of long-term U.S. housing value. It tracked the huge zoom to historic highs less than two years before the mortgage crisis crashed the economy and caused the Great Recession. We have yet to climb back to those 2006 numbers, though charts remain on an incline.

At the top of the hour, Consumer Confidence and State Street Investor Confidence reports will be released, which may help further spur positive market sentiment. Keep in mind we are still a couple weeks out from Q1 earnings season, so we will take our econ when and where we can get it for now.

Mark Vickery
Senior Editor

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