Existing-home sales rose 1.5% in September, but the year is still lower. How do you read housing data?

The National Association of Realtors reported existing-home sales of 3.99 million at a seasonally adjusted annual rate in September, up 1.5% on August but 2.2% lower than a year earlier. The median price was $417,500, and unsold inventory reached 1.60 million (existing-home sales report).

A monthly rise after two slow months can look like a recovery, but the annual figure is still lower. Higher inventory gives buyers more room to negotiate, and the annual rate is a projection of one month's pace rather than a count of completed sales. The monthly rise and the 2.2% annual fall point in different directions, which is a reminder that a single release rarely tells the whole story.

We would like to hear how you read a housing release:

• Do you read a monthly gain in existing-home sales as a turn, or as noise?
• Which housing number do you check first: sales, prices or inventory?
• How do you link a weak housing market to the dollar or to rate expectations?
• Have you traded a housing release and found it told a different story from the Census data?

For the builder side of the market, see the NAHB index.

Please share your own approach and reasoning, not calls for others to copy. Posts that promise a direction or sell signals will be removed.