Homebuilders

The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo gauge decreased six points to a three-month low of 50. The figure was below all estimates in a Bloomberg survey of economists.

Loans to buy newly constructed properties increased by 0.2% from June and was up 35.5% compared to the year prior, the Mortgage Bankers Association found.

But that was offset by a decrease in most other residential construction materials, the National Association of Home Builders said.

The cohort is outperforming the broader market — up more than 50% year-to-date versus the S&P 500's 18% gain. 

Nonbank brokers and lenders typically scale back after the spring homebuying season and the housing market could be particularly slow for the rest of this year.

Purchases of new single-family homes fell 2.5% to an annualized 697,000 pace after a downward revision to the prior month, government data showed Wednesday.

"I do believe you'll begin to see some improvement, or increases, in new housing as we head into the back half of the year," Chief Financial Officer Jim Peters said in an interview. "We're hearing optimistic stuff from the builders we deal with."

Rising interest rates during June worked to hold potential new homebuyers out of the market, the Mortgage Bankers Association's Builder Application Survey found.

Residential starts fell 8% last month to a 1.43 million annualized rate, according to government data released Wednesday.

The nearly 8% growth on a seasonally adjusted annualized basis is well above the historical average, according to the government-sponsored enterprise.