Posted by Linda H on 6:55:00 AM
Prices for single-family homes climbed in half of U.S. cities in the first quarter as real estate markets stabilized. The median sales
price increased from a year earlier in 74 of 146 metropolitan areas measured, the National Association of Realtors said in a report today. In the fourth quarter, only 29 areas had gains.
“The housing market is still depressed but it had a good quarter,” Patrick Newport, an economist at IHS Global Insight in Lexington, Massachusetts, said in a telephone interview today. “We’re on the mend but it’s still something that will take two or three years before we’re back to normal.”
Posted by Linda H on 6:38:00 AM
Wages and salaries -- the total paycheck for all Americans -- climbed 2.2 percent in the 12 months through March after adjusting for inflation, according to calculations by RBS Securities Inc. economist
Omair Sharif.
Payrolls have increased by 1.82 million in the past 12 months, helping reduce the unemployment rate to 8.1 percent from 9 percent. Photographer: Ty Wright/Bloomberg
Incomes are getting a boost from job growth and gains in hours, which will give Americans the means to increase spending at the fastest pace in six years, say Sharif and Pierpont Securities LLC economist
Stephen Stanley. That’s allaying concern that hourly earnings, a widely watched measure of consumer buying power, are stagnating.
Apple Needs to Make it in America
