The National Association of Realtors reported that sales of existing homes dropped -2.2% in September to a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 5.38 million, although sales were +3.9% higher than a year ago. The median price for existing homes has been increasing for 91 consecutive months, and was $272,100 in September, up +5.9% for the year. The supply of existing unsold homes at the current sales pace was down from 4.4 months a year ago to 4.1 months in September. The report attributed quickly increasing prices to the lack of inventory and cited price increases as a reason why historically low interest rates have not increased sales as much as expected.

New home sales fell -0.7% in September from August’s 706,000 SAAR to 701,000, but were up +15.5% from September 2018’s 607,000 rate. However, the median sales price dropped -7.9% for the month from $325,200 to $299,400, and was down -8.8% over the year. By region, sales were up for the year in the Northeast (+29.6%), the South (+24.0%), and the West (+11.5%), but fell in the Midwest (-17.3%). The supply of new homes for sale at the current sales rate remained unchanged from August at 5.5 months, or 321,000 homes for sale.

New orders for durable goods were down -1.1% in September after three consecutive monthly increases, including an upwardly revised +0.3% rate for August, and were down -0.8% over the past 12 months. Transportation orders were down -3.6% primarily due to a steep drop in civilian aircraft orders (-39.3%) and a smaller drop in military aircraft orders (‑13.0%) which were somewhat offset by a +5.3% increase for motor vehicles. New orders excluding transportation were down -0.3%, with increases in electrical equipment/appliances (+4.3%), communications equipment (+3.3%), and fabricated metal products (+2.1%) offsetting drops for computers (-6.1%), primary metals (-3.7%), and machinery (-0.1%). Core capital goods orders, which exclude both defense and aircraft, were down -0.5% after a downwardly revised -0.6% drop in August, but were up +1.0% compared to September 2018.