New Home Sales Skyrocketed in April, Probably…; Borrowers Self-Sidelining; Rates Move Higher

New Home Sales Skyrocketed in April, Probably…; Borrowers Self-Sidelining; Rates Move Higher

New home sales surged in April after a disappointing report in March. The Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development said today that sales were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 619,000, an increase of 16.6 percent from the previous month and 23.8 percent higher than in April 2015. That said, it should be noted that this report has a notoriously high margin of error, with this month's ringing in at 15.4 percent. Sales in March were also higher than earlier reported . Last month's report had those sales down from February by 1.5 percent to a seasonally an annual rate of 511,000. That number has now been revised to 531,000. On a non-seasonally adjusted basis there were 61,000 newly adjusted homes sold during the month. In March sales totaled 50,000. At the end of