Sales of new homes in January highest in five years

Sales of new homes jumped unexpectedly in January despite bad weather in many parts of the country according to the U.S. Census Bureau, to the highest levels since January of 2008.

“I’m hopeful the recovery in home sales will get back on track in the next couple of months,” said Jim O’Sullivan, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics in Valhalla, New York, who projected demand would increase told Bloomberg News. “If we continue to get solid employment growth, which was the trend last year, chances are you’ll see home sales continue their uptrend.”

The Wall Street Journal cautioned again “the Census new-home sales data is a choppy indicator with a small sample size, and when you take a longer look at the series it’s pretty clear that the nation’s two-year-old real estate turnaround is still largely a recovery in prices.”

Read the full story from Bloomberg here.