Friday, June 22, 2018

Albuquerque Grabs 53% of May Job Growth

During May, the state’s three small metro areas continued the year-over-year job “growth” patterns from April. The big difference was fewer wage jobs (not seasonally adjusted) lost. Las Cruces lost 800 jobs. Farmington dropped 100. Santa Fe added 600 jobs, making a net loss of 300 jobs among the three. During April the three-metro net loss was 900.
Albuquerque added 7,300 jobs during May, or 1.9%, to account for 53% of the statewide gain of 13,800 jobs, or 1.7%.
The state’s 1.7% gain was less than half of Utah’s 3.5% growth. Other states in the region continued well ahead of New Mexico. Colorado, Nevada and Texas all showed 2.8% year-over-year growth with Arizona just behind at 2.6%. Oklahoma tied New Mexico’s 1.7% with Wyoming at 1.5%.
The broad sector growth was discussed in the June 16 post as was the Eddy / Lea County performance. I won’t repeat.
In Albuquerque professional and business services (lawyers, accountants, engineers, landscape architects) led the sector growth with 3,800 new wage jobs or 6.3% growth. That was 52% of Albuquerque’s job growth over the year. The other happy growing sectors were construction (+1,200), financial (+1,100), leisure and hospitality (+1,100), and trade +(600). Education and health services dropped 1,400 jobs.
In Santa Fe, the gainers were miscellaneous other services, up 400, and leisure and hospitality, up 300.
Las Cruces lost 600 government jobs.

Saturday, June 16, 2018

Job Growth Gains Significance

The New Mexico rate of unemployment continues down, though the state retains its grip on the nation’s third highest rate at 5.1% unemployed. The state’s drop in unemployment rate hit the “statistically significant” mark for both the one month change from 5.4% in April to 5.1% in May and year-over-year with the change from 6.2% in May 2017. The one-month performance of -0.3 percentage points was the nation’s best.
The Department of Workforce Solutions released the May job report yesterday.
Our year over year seasonally adjusted employment change, a 1.6% increase, was also statistically significant. There were 828,500 people employed in the state in May 2017 and 841,700 in May 2018, a 13,200 increase. The labor force grew by 10,000. Employment grew by 20,000 and unemployment dropped 9,000.
Switching to a not seasonally adjusted basis, Eddy and Lea counties, now dealing with a drilling boom, accounted for a quarter of the year-over-year job growth. Eddy County employment increased by 1,914. Lea employment grew 1,452.
Again not seasonally adjusted basis, over the year, the labor fore grew by 20,000.
The improvement covered most of the major supersectors. (These used to called “sectors.”)
The increases (not seasonally adjusted) were in mining, 300; construction, 2,900 (6.4%); non-durable manufacturing, 700; transportation and warehousing, 1,700; financial, 2,000; professional and business services, 3,000 (3.7%); and leisure and hospitality, 3,400 (3.5%, summer hiring?).
Health care and social assistance and information, both down 700, were the only sectors of size to lose more than a few jobs.
State government education dropped 900 jobs (university summer school?). Local government education dropped 400 (public schools out for the summer?).

Monday, June 11, 2018

Home Sales Drop 2.4% During May From May 2017

During May the sale closed for 88% of the homes with sale pending. That’s a number relationship, not reality. But the suggestion is that the sale went through on nearly all the potential sales. That’s a change.
The sale closed during May for 1,200 single family detached homes, a 2.4% drop from May 2017. Those homes were on the market an average of 40 days, a 9.1% quicker sale than during May 2017. The old rule of thumb was that a home sale took 45 days to close, plus or minus.
The inventory of homes for sale was 3,035, 17.7%, or 651 less than a year ago.
Put all these figures together and it seems as if the metro Albuquerque market is getting really, really tight. The Greater Albuquerque Association of Realtors released the May sales report today.
Pending sales did increase during May, as compared to a year before, up 244, or 21.6%. That increase was a mere 15 over April, so year-over-year implies not much. It was the largest percentage increase in pending sales for more than a year.
The median sales price, $210,000 during May increased from April, up $5,000, or 3%. A year ago during May, the median price was $199,000.
However, the average price, $239,281 for May, dropped a bit from April, down one percent, or $2,756. April’s average price increased 1.6% from April 2017.