(New York)

There have been some serious warnings about real estate from reputable sources lately, but not much data to support them. To this point, most fears have been centered around how rising rates might hurt the market, but none of that had emerged in the data, until now. A new US housing report has just showed that sales of existing US homes fell 2.5% in April. Low inventory and higher prices seem to be putting a dampening effect on buyers, says the Wall Street Journal.

FINSUM: This is a worrying stat for us, and its importance is elevated by the fact that the figure comes from April, which is part of the all-important spring home-buying season. The next few months of data will be very important.