Economists' Outlook

Housing stats and analysis from NAR's research experts.

Latest Metro Level Employment Conditions (July 2015)

  • Over 2.9 million net new jobs were added to the national economy over the past 12 months to July. Not surprisingly, 83 percent of metro markets added jobs while only 17 percent did not create jobs or suffered a net lost. This improving job trend will underpin growth in real estate transactions going forward.
  • Among the states, Utah is the clear leader with 4.5 percent growth. The next fastest growing states are Florida, Nevada, Washington, and Oregon. Only two states had fewer jobs compared to one year ago: North Dakota and West Virginia. The full list of state performance is in table below.
  • A solid majority of states (42) experienced a strengthening condition compared to the prior month. For example, the top state of Utah has picked up pace to 4.5 percent growth from 4.4 percent growth in the prior month. Only 8 states had weakening conditions. The state of Washington, for example, is moving along nicely with 3.5 percent year-over-year gain in jobs, but that is a slower than 3.9 percent pace the prior month.
  • Among the large metro markets, here are few outstanding performers.
    • Provo-Orem (7.2%)
    • San Jose (6.2%)
    • Grand Rapids (4.8%)
    • Salt Lake City (4.4%)
    • Orlando (4.1%)
    • Riverside-San Bernardino (4.0%)
    • Portland, OR (3.8%)
    • Seattle (3.8%)
    • Dallas-Ft. Worth (3.7%)
    • Austin (3.6%)
    • Charlotte (3.6%)
    • Nashville (3.6%)
  • It is pleasing to note of the recovery in markets along the shores of Lake Erie. That’s because they had suffered a lot and had consistently congregated near the bottom in job growth. The Detroit market, as one example, had lost 500,000 jobs before showing recovery of 300,000 in recent years. Currently, Detroit is coming around at a respectable speed of 2.5 percent. A similar trend can be observed in Toledo, Cleveland, and Buffalo. Perhaps, it’s time to ditch the label – the Rust Belt.

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