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The early spring across much of the United States and record low mortgage rates prompted many forecasters to believe that the housing bust was finally hitting a bottom. Anecdotal tales from many markets seemed to indicate that sales were rising (albeit slowly) and that prices were bottoming in some markets like Phoenix and Miami. Inventories have also been falling both nationally and in key markets.

This morning, the Commerce Department released the March new home sales data which showed a decline of 7.1% from February at 328,000. However, this headline was somewhat misleading because February was revised higher to 353,000 from the previous report of 313,000.

February was the highest number of new home sales since November 2009. January and December sales were also revised higher.

New home sales have averaged over 335,000 the last 5 months after averaging below 300,000 the previous 18 months.

Inventories rose to 5.3 months from 5.0 months in February. This is a normal level of inventories.

Is this spring the turn we've all been waiting for in residential construction?

Is the housing market about to finally take off and really start contributing to this economic recovery?

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