Housing’s double hit

The National Association of Realtors presented July’s US home sales as good news. The number of previously owned homes sold fell by just 0.2% in the month and the median price was only 0.6% lower than in the previous year. But what the trade group might have focused on was the soaring inventory of unsold homes. That is likely to be bad for financial markets soon, and for growth later. The stock of unsold homes has risen by almost a third in the past year and has more than doubled since 2004, fro...