Articles

Falling interest rates in the closing weeks of 2023 helped to bring buyers off the sidelines and provide a boost for new home sales. Sales of newly built, single-family homes in December increased 8.0% to a 664,000 seasonally adjusted annual rate from an upwardly revised reading in November, according to newly released data by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. Census Bureau. The pace of new home sales in December is up 4.4% from a year earlier. Read More

Personal income increased $60.0 billion (0.3 percent at a monthly rate) in December. Disposable personal income (DPI)—personal income less personal current taxes—increased $51.8 billion (0.3 percent). Read More

Real gross domestic product (GDP) increased at an annual rate of 3.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2023, according to the "advance" estimate. Read More

Privately‐owned housing starts in December were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,460,000, 4.3% below the revised November estimate of 1,525,000 but 7.6% above the December 2022 rate of 1,357,000, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Single‐family housing starts in December were at a rate of 1,027,000; this is 8.6% below the revised November figure of 1,124,000. The December rate for units in buildings with five units or more was 417,000. Read More

The housing market hit a recession in mid-2022 and has already started to recover, said Connor Lokar of ITR Economics, during his talk to CCA Global members at the group’s ConnecXtion conference in Dallas, Texas. Read More

Builder confidence in the market for newly built single-family homes climbed seven points to 44 in January, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI). Read More

Freight rates for containers from China to Europe are up thee times due to turmoil in the Red Sea, reports Container xChange. Read More

In the first eleven months of 2023, total U.S. imports of ceramic tile were 170.8 million square meters, a decline of 9.5% from the same period in 2022 when imports were 188.7 million square meters, according to Grosser Consulting. Read More

Signs are pointing to the beginning of a U.S. floor coverings sales recovery. Catalina Research estimates U.S. square foot sales is projected to increase by 2.5 percent in the first quarter of 2024. Read More

Tile is truly a global flooring product. With so many vendors exploring fashion and technology, innovation in both look and composition enables a large scale appetite for the various new products from all around the world. Thanks to this continuing globalization, tile’s market reach is one that extends worldwide and remains robust and diversified. Read More