So important to look beyond the headline and seasonally adjusted numbers here. Short thread. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/22/september-existing-home-sales-jump-9point5percent.html

Existing home sales are reported to be up 9.4% from previous month and 20.9% from last year! All while inventory is down 19.2% year over year. What gives?

Basically what’s happened is that the spring/summer demand has been pushed to the fall. Normally the market starts cooling in September, so this September *looks* exceptionally hot compared to most Septembers.

But if we look at unadjusted numbers, they’re unchanged from last month. Yes they’re up 24,4% from last year, but see previous tweet.

Perma-bulls are going to run with this saying everything is back to normal, but I fear they’re speaking too soon. Inventory is incredibly low, and this isn’t going to help sales recover through the rest of the year once seasonality starts to kick in.

In fact if we just look at single family homes, unadjusted sales are actually *down* from last month. Anyways just something (I’m going) to keep an eye on throughout the rest of the year.