Did anybody else feel that something was fishy about Monday's stock market bounce?
Headlines like this - "Stocks surge on bank plan, rise in home sales" made me a little curious about what they were using as a sign of a rise in home sales.
As usual, the media is making a hash of the statistics.
Yes sales rose in February over January, they almost always do as housing sales are seasonal.
In reality, according to the NAR housing sales were DOWN 4.6% from February 2008. That's the important statistic, not that they were up 5% from January.
How is Portland doing? While the number of closed sales were up 17% from January they were DOWN 38.1% from February 2008. (Clint's charts show this well here.)
So while the overall US market is showing signs of nearing a bottom, Portland is still showing signs of being in the throes of a major decline.
And once again I'm left shaking my head at the quality of the journalism in the US.
