Even leaving out the hurricane affected South, new home sales decline

Yesterday’s new home sales report, on a nationwide basis anyway, can be thrown into the trash basket.  As the Census Bureau made clear, about 30% fewer counties in Florida and Texas were unable to report. Further, those two states combined accounted for 14% of the total market in 2016. Note, by the way, that Irma didn’t hit Florida until September, so probably only a decline in Texas is reflected in the August number.