New home starts fall

The Commerce Department said today that housing starts in August decreased the most since April, down 5.0 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 571,000 units. Plus, July’s starts were also revised down to a 601,000 unit pace, which was previously reported as a 604,000 unit rate.

New housing starts are now running less than one third of their rate during the housing boom.

Here’s my take on this, first of all, this is how Reuters reported this story:  “Housing starts fell more than expected”. What’s ironic about this, is that for the last two years or so, practically every report from major news services that is or can be perceived as negative starts out with a similar statement. For this Reuters statement, I’d like to know who they’re referring to. Other similar news stories usually have a statement like, economists  surprised or far from from forecast, etc. does this mean that there were no economist or industry spokespersons who could accurately predict upcoming monthly economic trends?

Also, I know I’ve said this many times in the recent past, but it is important, so I’ll say it again. This report of new housing starts combined with the other recent spring and summer real estate reports showing a downward trend are all occurring during a seasonally strong real estate marketing period. So, I believe the fall and winter of 2010 will continue the downward trend in the real estate market.