The Obama Administration released the June Housing Scorecard today. The graphs are a little hard to read, but they do provide a list of sources. On modifications they provide a graph showing 2.95 million total modifications for Hope Now, HAMP, and FHA loss mitigation (page 3). There are also private…

Click on graph for larger image in new window. This graph shows the high and low unemployment rates for each state (and D.C.) since 1976. The red bar is the current unemployment rate (sorted by the current unemployment rate). Sixteen states and D.C. now have double digit unemployment rates.…

Click on graph for larger image in new window. Total housing starts were at 549 thousand (SAAR) in June, down 5% from the revised May rate of 578,000 (revised down from 593 thousand), and up 15% from the all time record low in April 2009 of 477 thousand (the…

Earlier I mentioned I wasn’t sure if the unemployment benefit extension would pass – it looks like it will pass tomorrow. The WSJ reports Senate Set to Extend Jobless Benefits On Tuesday, Democrats are likely to get the 60 votes they need to extend the benefits through November. … The…

Moody’s reported today that the Moody’s/REAL All Property Type Aggregate Index increased 3.6% in May. This is a repeat sales measure of commercial real estate prices. Below is a comparison of the Moodys/REAL Commercial Property Price Index (CPPI) and the Case-Shiller composite 20 index. Notes: Beware of the “Real” in…

CR Note: Last month, housing economist Tom Lawler’s forecast was well below the consensus of 6.2 million (SAAR) for May and close to the actual reported existing home sales (he does a bottom up calculation every month, and he has been very close). Here is his preview for this…

Note: any number under 50 indicates that more builders view sales conditions as poor than good. Click on graph for larger image in new window. This graph shows the builder confidence index from the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB). The housing market index (HMI) was at 14 in June.…

From Matthew Saltmarsh at the NY Times: Moody’s Cuts Ireland’s Credit Rating Moody’s Investors Service downgraded Ireland one notch, to Aa2 from Aa1 … Moody’s also changed the outlook on the ratings to stable from negative. “Today’s downgrade is primarily driven by the Irish government’s gradual but significant loss of…

First, some earlier posts: Weekly Summary and a Look Ahead (Housing, Bernanke testimony, Euro stress tests all coming up). Sovereign Debt Part 5A. What Happens If Things Go Really Badly? And some more stories: From Chris Bryant at the Financial Times: IMF and EU defer talks with Hungary Hungarian assets…

Here is the Weekly Summary and a look ahead (Housing, Bernanke testimony, Euro stress tests all coming up). CR Note: This series is from reader “some investor guy”. In order to keep the Really Bad scenario from becoming massively long, it’s in several pieces. This one is only on sovereign…