New Home Sales: February 2011

Today, the U.S. Census Department released its monthly New Residential Home Sales Report for February showing a truly dramatic decline of 16.9% in sales nationally since January dropping to the lowest level on record and falling 28.0% below the level seen in February 2010 to just 250K SAAR units.

These results, while being pretty shocking especially considering the delusions of housing recovery that circulated in 2010, clearly indicate that the nation's housing markets are now firmly entrenched in a double-dip and come fully in-line with the other pitiful housing data-points I have outlined in past weeks.

As a result of the slower sales pace, the monthly supply increased to 8.9 months while the median selling price declined a notable 8.92% and the average selling price declined a whopping 13.41%.

The following chart show the extent of sales decline to date (click for full-larger version).