Housing News Sends Stocks Higher

Posted by Steve Schmidt on February 3, 2010

By Steve Shaeffer – Forbes.com – February 2, 20010, 12:45 PM EST

Aside from some wobbles around the opening bell, Wall Street rallied Tuesday to extend Monday’s gains.

The biggest news came out of the housing space, where a key indicator for home sales offered an encouraging sign and a builder posted its first profit in nearly three years.

Chief Economist Lawrence Yun said that while the home-buyer tax credit has produced some swings in contract activity, the underlying trend over the past year has been one of improvement, a view reinforced by fourth-quarter results from D.R. Horton ( DHI – news – people ).

Shares of the home builder jumped 10.9% after it reported its first quarterly profit since 2007. (See “D.R. Horton Builds A Profit.”) D.R. Horton said new orders and completed sales increased significantly in the quarter.

Complete Story

Aside from some wobbles around the opening bell, Wall Street rallied Tuesday to extend Monday’s gains. The biggest news came out of the housing space, where a key indicator for home sales offered an encouraging sign and a builder posted its first profit in nearly three years.

The National Association of Realtors said its pending home sales index, which measures signed contracts and is considered a strong predictor of sales in coming months, inched up 1% in December to 96.6. Chief Economist Lawrence Yun said that while the home-buyer tax credit has produced some swings in contract activity, the underlying trend over the past year has been one of improvement, a view reinforced by fourth-quarter results from D.R. Horton ( DHI – news – people ).

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