From MS

Existing home sales were surprisingly weak in June, plunging 5.4% to 4.37 million, an eight-month low. This was a major divergence from the pending home sales index, which surged 5.9% in June to a two-year high.




TED WIESEMAN makes a good point that the implication is that a rising number of home sales are falling through before closing, which has been a persistent problem that these data suggest may be worsening. All things considered however as MINACK wrote in his recent note, housing is small (2.3% of GDP) and while potential GDP gain from stronger housing could easily be swamped by slowdown elsewhere given business investment & exports are slowing and the key macro issue – the fiscal cliff, remains unresolved.

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