Consumer Confidence Dips as Short-Term Outlook Worsens
6 minutes ago
Consumer confidence dipped in June, as worries about the short-term outlook overshadowed improvement in people’s views on their current economic situation.
The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index came in at 100.4 in June, down almost a full point from revised May results. The results were nearly a half-point better than economist forecasts for the month.
Year-ahead inflation expectations declined slightly to 5.3% in June, offering a mixed view of the economy.
“Income expectations were down, vacation plans were up and households’ views of the labor market and business conditions were little changed,” wrote Wells Fargo economists Shannon Seery Grein and Jeremiah Kohl.
Conference Board Chief Economist Dana Peterson noted consumer confidence readings had remained within a narrow range over the past two years.
“Consumers expressed mixed feelings this month: their view of the present situation improved slightly overall, driven by an uptick in sentiment about the current labor market, but their assessment of current business conditions cooled. Meanwhile, for the second month in a row, consumers were a bit less pessimistic about future labor market conditions,” Peterson said.
-Terry Lane
Home Prices Hit Another All-Time High
2 hr 28 min ago
Houses are getting more expensive by the month, although the pace of growth is slowing down.
Nationwide home prices rose 6.3% over the year in April, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller Home Price Index, Dow Jones Indices said Tuesday. That jump was less than the 6.5% increase in March, but enough to lift the index to a fresh all-time high.
Home prices have continued climbing this year amid solid demand for housing, despite high mortgage rates pushing monthly payments out of reach for many buyers. Reasons for the continued growth in prices include a chronic housing shortage and the fact that relatively few homes are for sale these days because of the mortgage rate lock-in effect.
There’s a vast difference between mortgage rates currently offered—6.87% last week according to Freddie Mac—and the rates that current homeowners secured years ago when rates got as low as 2.65%. That’s discouraging sellers from putting their homes on the market.
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