New Home Pending Sales Fell In December

New home pending sales fell on a monthly and annual basis to close out the year, according to the Zonda Pending Home Sales Index…(Zonda)

• M-O-M: The national index fell 4.0% to 157.3 in December.

• Y-O-Y: This is 5.3% lower than the index at the same time one year ago.

NOTE: An index value over 100 indicates the housing market is doing better than June 2016.

Las Vegas, NV had the best month by far with a 10.6% jump since November followed by San Francisco, CA (+4.8%) and Minneapolis, MN (+4.4%)

• Los Angeles, CA had the best year by far with a 36.4% jump year-over-year followed by Orlando, FL (+23.8%) and San Antonio, TX (+19.0%)

Ali Wolf, chief economist at Zonda Economics, said that builders are hoping to increase production, but supply chain worries persist

• “The expectation is that new home supply will increase throughout the year but development and building delays continue to pose a challenge in trying to get more homes built.”

REMINDER: Pending home sales data will be out on Thursday from National Association of Realtors and economists are projecting a 2.2% month-over-month decline and a 2.7% year-over-year drop.