U.S. pending home sales climb 44.3% in May

The National Association of Realtors (NAR) announced on Monday its seasonally adjusted pending home sales index (PHSI) surged 44.3 percent m-o-m to 99.6 in May, after an unrevised 21.8 percent m-o-m decline in April. This was the highest m-o-m gain in the index since NAR started this series in January 2001.

Economists had expected pending home sales to jump 18.9 percent m-o-m in May.

On y-o-y basis, the index sank 5.1 percent after a 33.8 percent decline in April.

According to the report, all regional indices recorded solid m-o-m gains in May after steep declines in April. The Northeast PHSI climbed 44.4 percent m-o-m to 61.5 in May, although it was still down 33.2 percent from a year ago. In the Midwest, the index surged 37.2 percent m-o-m to 98.8 last month, down 1.4 percent from May 2019. Pending home sales in the South jumped 43.3 percent m-o-m to an index of 125.5 in May, up 1.9 percent from May 2019. The index in the West grew 56.2 percent m-o-m in May to 89.2, down 2.5 percent from a year ago.

“This has been a spectacular recovery for contract signings, and goes to show the resiliency of American consumers and their evergreen desire for homeownership,” noted Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief economist. “This bounce back also speaks to how the housing sector could lead the way for a broader economic recovery.”