By Ian McKendry
WASHINGTON (MNI) – The National Association of Realtors will
announce downward revisions to U.S. existing-home sales starting from
2007 on, when it releases the regularly scheduled existing-home sales
report for November, on Wednesday December 21.
The NAR said “an up-drift in sales projections” led to a divergence
starting in 2007 between the NAR model used to calculate home sales
rates and the actual marketplace.
“Although there are downward revisions for total sales in recent
years, there is little change to previously reported monthly comparisons
or characterizations based on percentage change,” the NAR said, adding
that there will be no changes to relative months supply or median home
prices.
The NAR has previously signaled there would be benchmark revisions
but that “resolving these issues has taking longer than anticipated in
the absence of decennial data from the U.S. Census Bureau, which are no
longer collected.” The NAR said it started to capture more transactions
than the model assumed based on the 2000 census.
The NAR will release the normal annual revisions with the January
existing-home sales report on February 22, 2012 which will “fine-tune
the data back through 2007.”
** Market News International Washington Bureau: 202-371-2121 **
[TOPICS: M$$AG$,M$U$$$,MAUDS$]
