The housing news out today shows a glimmer of good news. July will make the fourth straight month that home sales have risen higher than the previous month. And perhaps more important, July 2009 sales are 5 percent higher than July 2008 sales.
Caveats from the always dependable blogger Barry Ritholtz: a lot of the uptick is coming from California where the prices on many homes have been cut as much as 50 percent. Inventories are still high. And prices outside of California still remain high. Ritholtz has said before that the crisis will not be over until the home-price-to-income ratios return to the historical levels. And nationwide we’re still a long way from that.
But price the key driver, especially when you consider how screwed up the federal government’s mortage rescue plan is. And these people want to take over our health care?
