{"id":362,"date":"2010-02-27T11:55:00","date_gmt":"2010-02-27T16:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.intuitiveinvestor.com\/web\/?p=362"},"modified":"2018-08-21T09:05:46","modified_gmt":"2018-08-21T13:05:46","slug":"sales-of-existing-homes-tumble","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/2010\/02\/27\/sales-of-existing-homes-tumble\/","title":{"rendered":"Sales of existing homes tumble"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-size: 16px;\">Yesterday the National Association of Realtors released its January data regarding sales of existing home sales.\u00a0 That is, the sale of used homes.\u00a0 The number was down 7.2% from December.\u00a0 This, despite the fact that U.S. government home buying incentives remain in place.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 16px;\"><strong>Analysis:<\/strong> Again, this is not a good statistic and is a sign that consumers are not willing to spend additional monies, even on assets.\u00a0 Earlier this week consumer confidence plunged &#8211; that will likely lead to very low growth, if any, in consumer spending.\u00a0 So consumers are sitting on cash.\u00a0 I have said since the beginning of the blog a year and a half ago that for there to be permanent change in the foundations of the U.S. economy it would have to shift away from its reliance on debt.\u00a0 I have also repeatedly highlighted the need for the U.S. consumer to shift to being net savers, instead of net spenders.\u00a0 Spending more than you earn is not a long-term, economically viable strategy.\u00a0 Eventually the lenders will say &#8220;no&#8221; to additional borrowings.\u00a0 However, in the short-term, and with regard to investing, yesterday&#8217;s existing home sales plunge does not bode well.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 16px;\">Yesterday&#8217;s data also came in conjunction with news of the lack of lending to consumers taking place around the country.\u00a0 Banks, still losing money on their poorly underwritten\u00a0mortgage portfolios, and unable to foist the mortgages on other institutions via Mortgage Backed Securities, are sitting on cash, too.\u00a0 Cash is the blood of the economy, banks the heart.\u00a0 If the heart refuses to pump blood then the body, the economy, dies or suffers from disease.\u00a0 Not good.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 16px;\">As I survey the investment landscape it looks like a great time to be in cash.\u00a0 The stock market is no bargain and the number of storm clouds gathering looks like a decline in equity values is inevitable.\u00a0 And after such a decline, that would be the time to buy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 16px;\"><strong>Importance grade:<\/strong> 5<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 16px;\">I hope that you are enjoying your weekend!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 16px;\">J<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday the National Association of Realtors released its January data regarding sales of existing home sales.\u00a0 That is, the sale of used homes.\u00a0 The number was down 7.2% from December.\u00a0 This, despite the fact that U.S. government home buying incentives remain in place. Analysis: Again, this is not a good statistic and is a sign [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jasonapollovoss.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}