Commercial Real Estate Blog

Last month, the NAHB (National Association of Home Builders)/Wells Fargo Housing Index reached an all time low of 18. July’s numbers were released last week, and they fell a further to points to 16. Anything north of 50 is considered good; and it is very obvious we’re very far off that mark.

The outlook for the future is also measured, and that figure too saw a decline from last month’s 27 to this month’s 23. The traffic figure, which measures buyer traffic slipped from 16 to 12.

The NAHB/Wells Fargo Sentiment Index guages the market sentiment of builders of single-family homes. The index has been tracking this data for over twenty years and the data they released yesterday indicates that sentiment is at an all-time low of 18. 50 is the median number, with any number over that indicates that more builders see conditions as good vs poor, and vice versa for numbers below that.

The index’s component indexes gauging current sales conditions and sales expectations for the next six months each remained unchanged in June, at 17 and 28, respectively. Meanwhile, the component gauging traffic of prospective buyers fell a single point to 17 indicating that there is no uptick in sight.

The data is available for viewing here:

• The NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index
• The NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index Components