It’s easy enough to find indexes that trace the ups and downs of building sector components – customer inquiries, project contracts, builder confidence, permits, and so on. But the National Association of Home Builders also has begun culling the data for what could be a more interesting – and, perhaps, useful – index that would zero in on what’s working, and where, in spite of the downturn.
Thus, a monthly indicator called the NAHB/First American Improving Markets Index (IMI), whose debut is set for 10 a.m. (Eastern time) on September 7, will rely on three economic indicators: employment growth (based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data), home price growth (based on data from Freddie Mac), and single-family housing permit growth (based on Census Bureau data).
The Metropolitan Statistical Areas that make the IMI list will have seen six continuous months of improvement in all three data sets.
NAHB says the IMI will be released on the fourth business day of each month, unless that day falls on a Friday, in which case the index will be released the following Monday. The NAHB website will publish tables and background information for each edition of the IMI at http://www.nahb.org/IMI
Additional housing-market analysis is available from NAHB’s Eye on Housing blog at http://eyeonhousing.wordpress.com/.
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