Better than Expected Economic Data This Week.

(Sep. 17) The week started with the August Real Estate Forecast Article. This article examined the data for New Home Construction, New Home Sales, and Existing Home sales. This article was written in advance of this week's August New Construction data and August's Existing Home Sales Report. The data was examined on month to month potential, August to August Potential, the sales made during the past 12 months and the sales made during the current year. There was an expected surge in New home starts, units under construction, and completions. The average sales price for August was supposed to set an August record for new home sales and existing home sales. Units sold were expected to improve considerably for new home sales. Existing home sales were expected to improve over last year. Inventory was going to help new home sales and may have negatively impacted existing home sales.

(Sep. 18) Earlier this month we received the August Jobs Report. There are many ways to examine the data. "Men and Women: Record August Jobs" look at the full-time job losses and gains since the beginning of the Jobs Recession, July 2007. Men lost the most full-time jobs and took the longest to recover those lost jobs. Women recovered the fastest and have added the most total jobs, full-time and part-time. Men still work more full-time jobs than women. Women still work more part-time jobs than men. Both have lower participation rates than they had July 2007.

(Sep. 19) It was projected that we would see August to August increases in New Constructions Starts, Units Under Construction, and New Construction Completions. We did see this happen. "August New Construction: Wow" details that August to August Starts were up, to the highest for August since 2007, Units under Construction were at their highest August Levels since 2007, and the same was true for Completions. Best data during the past eleven years.

(Sep. 20) Do you know what was also remarkable this week? Weekly Unemployment Claims. The non-seasonally adjusted first-time unemployment claims data was recorded under 200,000 claims for the 15th week this year. Last year we had 4 weeks under 200,000. We had two weeks under 200,000 during 2016 and one week under 200,000 claims during 2015. The Continuing Claims data remained below 1.500 million non-seasonally adjusted continuing claims. Do we have "Hurricane-proof Unemployment Claims Data?"

(Sep. 20) Thursday we also saw the release of the August Existing Home Sales Data. It was reported as being flat. It depends on your perspective, We had more total sales this August than last August, non-seasonally adjusted (NSA,) and we had better inventory data, NSA, than last August. The current year sales data is falling between where we were during August 2016 and August 2017.. We also set a record average sales price for August. "New August Record Average Sales Price, Existing Homes" explains how the data was recorded better than it was reported.

Next week we will receive more data on the housing sector with new home sales data. We should also receive data on weekly unemployment claims that will be remarkably good. This data will be the unemployment data closest to the employment situation report collection date. They are two different data sets so the data is only an indicator of what could be expected from the September Jobs Report.

It's the Economy.