See that “little” down tick to the right of the chart below? That is the loest piont in the last 4 decades. Yes, we are see in a housing depression and the fact is that there is still too much backlog and way too much overall inventory.

What does this mean for the housing sector – not a good outlook…

The recent durable goods report was helped by that odd transport number that was non-existent in the December report. Without it, there was a very apparent miss. With the U.S. dollar in the tank and consumers obviously spending again, what is the probelm?

It looks as though big-ticket items are not so fast to be bought. That has to be due to the lack of stability that most are feeling.

Perhaps some of the lack of stability can be blamed on the employment situation. Even though we are starting to crack the 400k barrier, it is far from enough to help the overall unemployment levels.

Let’s see how things look if we can get initial claims down under 300k per week.

Getting better all the time… Or are more running out of benefits? This is a question that has been hotly debated. From the looks of the chart, we could say that it is good that less are collecting unemployment benefits. On the the other hand, not many people are being hired… There is a gap between these that needs to be reconciled.