The WAY to WOW Shows
Economic Echoes
June 18, 2025
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[0:03] Who are you? And where are you going? What do you want? [Music] Hello and welcome to People Making Money. I'm your host, Kevin Bemel, and I'm here every Wednesday at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time to talk about job hunting, starting and building a business, building wealth, all the whole financial side of life. And today is our my uh

[0:39] monthly economic echoes where we break down the monthly economic data and talk about how it's going to affect your economy. Um because none of us live the the national economy. We all live our own individual lives. This is always a a jam-packed show. So, I'm going to get uh right into uh sharing the data. And we always start out by looking at the consumer price index. And oops,

[1:16] I've been I've been good about uh remembering to uh um shut my email, but that every once in a while I forget. So, okay. So the consumer price index for um for May uh went up.1% uh and um seasonally adjusted and it rose uh 2.4% over the last 12 months not seasonally adjusted. Okay. And you can see that that there you go. There's the 2.4% um

[1:51] year-over-year. So 0.1% uh in May if we were to annualize that which isn't exactly the right way to do it but because it does vary obviously from month to month but 0.1% would would be you know 1.2% 2% a on an annualized basis. Certainly, that would be well within the Federal Reserve uh bank's uh Federal Federal Reserve Board's target, which is 2% even at the unadjusted annual rate of 2.4% 4% uh where you can

[2:27] see that the the CPI consumer price index is pretty close to uh where um the the the Federal Reserve Board um where where their target is. Um and and this the May rate, you know, ostensibly is taking into into account uh some of the effects of the volatility and prices caused by the levying of tariffs. Of course, that was a a somewhat um um tumultuous time. Tariffs were levied, they were changed,

[3:04] they were taken off, some were reimposed. Uh so uh but it doesn't appear u that in the end that had much of an impact at least in terms of overall consumer prices. Now uh what what we now you know we'll see you know going forward into June and July although economically things have uh calmed down I think significantly over the last few weeks and and so you know we'll see if there's more uh tumult to come. Um the you know the

[3:41] president is when all is said and done um much more of a practical uh individual than an ideologue. And so uh my my supposition is is is that uh you know he will he will tamp down the volatility if he can because that that doesn't serve his purposes. Uh but we'll have to see what happens there. So you can see that the overall rate is 2.4%. 4% food went up 2.9% that was uh offset by energy decreasing

[4:16] 3.5%. So the rate on all categories less food and energy is 2.8%. Okay. Uh which is the so-called core inflation rate. So let's let's drill down now. So food at home went up 2.2%. Food away from home went up 3.8%. That's continuing. a months months monthsl long trend. Eating out is getting ever more expensive while uh the the the cost to eat in is is is increasing at a more moderate pace. Um and as usual

[4:52] um proteins saw the biggest increase. Again, this is a a monthsl long trend. Um pro longer than that really probably a year'sl long trend now. So they went up over 6% as opposed to cereals went up which went cereals and bakery products went up at 1% dairy 1.7% fruits and vegetables went down a half a percent that's always good for me. Uh and non-alcoholic beverages went up 3% food at home other food at home went up 1.4%. So, if you're drinking non-alcoholic beverages like soda pop, juices, that

[5:28] sort of thing, and you're eating a proteinheavy diet, so you're likely experiencing higher food costs than would be uh you know, typical throughout the country. Um, but if you're eating a diet that's that's heavy in fruits, and vegetables, that's at least a little bit offsetting uh some of the increase in meats, poultries, fish, and eggs. Now I I would I would bet that a lot of this increase is uh caused by egg prices which continue to be high. Um they have not ameliorated yet. Um that that hopefully

[6:06] will come later in the year. Um but we'll have to see. Okay. So that's that's the picture on food at home. Food in restaurants. So you can see that that both went up. Food at full service restaurants and snacks uh went up 4.2%. 2%. Uh food away from home limited service meals and snacks like fast food restaurants went at 3.5%. But you can see both went up pretty pretty significantly. Okay. So, uh eating at home is getting ever more expensive on the energy front. So, as has been the trend for quite a while

[6:42] now, energy commodities dropped uh 11.6%. Okay, this is again over a 12-month period. uh energy service was was services went up almost 7%. And the drop in this case was both fuel oil and gasoline. Okay, gasoline year-over-year has gone down 12% whereas fuel oil has gone down 8.6%. And then energy services, you can see electricity's gone up 4 and a.5%, natural gas has gone up 15.3%. So, if you have if if your home has uh

[7:20] both gas heating and cooking, you're likely seeing bigger increases. Now, um a lot of of of electricity generation is uh powered by natural gas. And so one would imagine that one of the reasons why we're seeing electricity costs go up is because the cost of natural gas has gone up which increases again the the cost to generate electricity. And then finally for non uh food and energy. So you can see commodities barely have barely budged

[7:56] really at.3% increase and services has gone up 3.6%. So commodities what's really gone up? Well, tobacco products have gone up over 6%. So, this is likely to be the long-term trend for tobacco products. uh um you know, as the um uh uh um a as we head toward the end time of the tobacco settlement,

[8:32] um I think that uh states are probably going to levy higher taxes on tobacco and smoking products to make up for the revenue that they were getting from the tobacco settlement. And so you're going to see the prices of tobacco products continue to increase um because states want that revenue. Okay. Uh alcoholic beverages went up a percent and a half, relatively modest. Uh used uh what is this? Yeah, used cars and trucks went up uh 1.8%.

[9:08] Okay. Apparel went down by almost a percent. Uh, new vehicles went down .04%. So, um, I don't know why is this saying energy commodities. This is used cars and trucks. Yeah, went up 1.8%. Uh, medical care basically unchanged. So, you can see the big increases were in used cars and trucks and tobacco and alcoholic beverages and the rest were were were pretty moderate. So uh and then uh en um services um across the

[9:43] across the board services uh non-food and energy related services have gone up. So uh the cost of housing went up almost 4% year-over-year, medical care 3%, transportation services also close to 3%. So um and and you know almost we all need shelter. Most of us need at least some kind of medical care even if it's only routine dental care and transportation services again most of us need that as well. So these this increase is inescapable.

[10:19] Um whereas uh to go back to uh commodities whereas smoking is is not essential. Right. So um uh so you know if if you're not a smoker, you for example um and you you're not buying a used car, so you may have experienced inflation a little bit lower uh than uh than than you know it it it is being reported nationwide. Okay, so that's the CPI. Now let's look at the consumer price index. I I look at

[10:54] Los Angeles because that's the market in which I live. But you can always uh look up your local market by searching whatever place you live. Omaha, Nebraska CPI, Miami CPI, uh Dallas CPI, what where wherever it is that you you live. Okay. And so here in California, area prices were up.1% over the past month, 3% from a year ago. You can see that the year-over-year prices price increases in Los Angeles are higher than the national

[11:29] average. Okay. And uh and and the the um core inflation rate, less food and energy in Los Angeles year-over-year went up 3.3%. Okay. So, not only is California and Los Angeles in particular an expensive place to live, uh, but um it is the the cost is going up faster than the nation as a whole. Right? The the uh core inflation rate uh for the country as as a whole is

[12:04] 2.8%. Here in California, it's 3.3% or here in Los Angeles, I should say, it's 3.3%. So, a half a percent higher in Los Angeles. And And you say, "Well, it's only a half a percent." Yes, but that you know, that's that's significant, right? if you're spending uh uh um you know uh if if you know if you're spending money you know if if if you're a lower income person so you know you're you're spending an extra um uh um

[12:39] 50 cents out of every $100 you spend more in Los Angeles than you would in another location. That's what I'm trying to to come up with there. Okay. uh food in Los Angeles. So food at home actually decreased a tenth of a percent in Los Angeles. Uh led by lower prices for meat, poultry, fish, and eggs, which went down 2.7%. So that's good news for Angelenos. Uh and food away from home also declined.1%. Okay, so uh it's a little bit less

[13:14] expensive to eat in Los Angeles. uh going from April to May um you know hopefully that trend will continue uh in in terms of energy so month over month um energy rose.1% but gasoline prices uh decreased 1.4%. So, um, a little bit of moderation in gasoline prices. Energy, um, over a year-over-year increased 1.9%, but gasoline prices have gone down almost 8%

[13:51] in Los Angeles. That's that's been a, you know, a saving grace for those of us who drive. And then for all items, less food and energy. So, they went up 2% in May. Um, this was led by uh higher uh medical care costs, higher shelter costs. Um, in contrast, prices for other goods and services went down 1.6% and apparel went down 1.3%. Okay, now that's that's on a month-over-month basis. now on a year-over-year basis again the core inflation rate so was up 3.3% led by

[14:28] medical care going up almost 6% shelter housing going up over 4% whereas the price for new and used cars went down a little over a percent and education and communication went down 6/10en of a percent it's it's a mixed bag um but overall as has as has been the trend now for quite a while not the the the prices are rising faster in Los Angeles than they are nationwide. Now, there are likely uh other locations where prices are are

[15:03] raising rising slower than they are uh nationwide and and for those of you who live in those locations, lucky you or or good decision. Okay, now let's look at current and real uh uh earnings for employees. This is on private non-farm payroll seasonally adjusted. So you can see that from real average earnings per hour uh went up three cents from going from April to May. Um and they went up uh let's see 55 and

[15:38] 74 about a$130 uh per week. Okay, so a little bit of an increase. So you can see that they went up.3% uh real average hourly earnings and three ten of a percent also uh real weekly um uh real weekly earnings went up uh.3% as well. Okay. uh the average uh weekly hours worked has stayed the same at 34.3 for you know quite a while. You can see it was it was that's what it was back in

[16:14] May 2024 and and it's been that way the last three months as well. So um uh yeah. Okay. Uh and so here we go. Let's see what else do I want to look at here. Okay. year-over-year percentages. So, uh um real um average weekly earnings that's adjusted for inflation um have gone up 1.4 and and 1.5% hourly and weekly. So,

[16:50] there's been a little bit of gain um gaining ground on inflation. Okay. And you can see that average hourly earnings um and average weekly earnings went up 3.9%. That's on a non um inflationadjusted uh basis. So um you know thing things are doing better here um than they were a year ago. Um and at least at least we're you know kind of barely keeping our heads ahead of inflation. Okay. And then uh next

[17:28] we're going to look at the unemployment rate. Okay. So the unemployment rate for for May of this year 4.2%. Um that's uh that's it's been at that for the last several months. Um even in February was 4.1%. So there's really been no significant uh change in the unemployment rate o since really since the beginning of the year. Let's see January I think it was yeah it's 4% in January. So it's it's gone up two10 of a

[18:04] percent over the last uh five months. Not not a particularly large change. Okay. For men 20 years and over uh the unemployment rate in May was 3.9%. That's down a tenth of a percent. So again, basically unchanged. And for women, the uh unemployment rate was also 3.9% last month. That's an increase from 3.7% in April. But still, these are very small changes, not having an appreciable uh impact on on employment trends. Okay. now. And

[18:41] then for teenagers, so you can see that it uh in May it went up to 13.4% uh up from 13% in April. You know, as school gets done, more teens are entering potentially the the summer job market looking for jobs. And so that would account for uh the increase in the teenage unemployment rate. Okay. And then by demographic. So the unemployment rate among white Americans in May 3.8% pretty much on par with the last several months. Uh for for black Americans uh in

[19:19] May it was 6% down from 6.3% in April. A bit of a a bit of a a change there. Okay. But it's been it's you know since the beginning of the year it's been 6.2 66 6.3. So, we're we're back down to its low point for 2025. And then for Asian-Americans, so you can see it bumped up to 3.6% from last month where it was 3%. So, that's a significant increase. Uh a 20% increase. Okay. And then finally for Hispanics, Latinos.

[19:56] So it was the uh the unemployment rate was 5.1% in May and that's down from 5.2 in April. Um February was 5.2. March it was 5.1. So it's been 5.1 5.2 for the last several months. Uh in January though it was 4.8. So there has been a bit of an increase um since the beginning of the year in unemployment among Hispanics and Hispanic Latinos. Okay. Next, let's now we all as I always say we need

[20:33] to look at the unemployment figures combined with the civilian labor force participation rate. Okay. So the labor force participation rate went down to 62.4% from 62.6%. So that would in some ways account for a lower inflation rate. It's not that more people found jobs, it's that fewer people were looking for jobs and so that lower lowers the unemployment rate as well. Okay. Among

[21:09] men 20 years and older, 70.1% are in the labor force. That's down from 70.3% in April. So you see that 2% drop showing up there among women. Um the the labor force participation rate for May is 58.6%. Down from 58.9. So a.3% drop among women. And then finally among teenagers there was a labor force participation rate drop from 36.9 to 36.2. Okay. So the increase

[21:50] in uh teenage unemployment did not come from teenagers entering the workforce. it came from fewer teenagers having jobs even as they're le even as teenagers are leaving the the workforce. So that's not a good trend for teenagers. We'll have to see how that shapes up uh as we head into um you know more of the summer. Okay. So now let's look again at demographics. Okay. So the uh labor force participation rate among white

[22:25] Americans dropped from uh 62.3% to 62%. So a a significant drop. Among black Americans it dropped to 62% from 62.1%. So not really a statistically significant change there. From for Asian-Americans it went from 66% in April to 65.9. Again, not statistically significant. And among uh Latinos, it it went from 62 point 67.3 to 67.2. So

[23:01] again, not the the the significant change or or the significant change in labor force participation really is is among white Americans um as opposed to uh uh black Americans, Asian-Americans, and Latinos, Latino Americans. So, uh, you know, don't know why, um, more more white Americans are dropping out of the, uh, the labor force. I can't even speculate on it, but but that seems to be what what the trend is. So, um, you know, does that match your uh does that

[23:39] match your experience? Um uh so uh you know I I you know that's something to to think about. Okay. Now let's look at um unemployment by industry. Okay. And this is another uh long-term trend. Uh private education. We saw uh in May uh seasonally adjusted one-mon net change. The largest is in uh private education and healthc care services. 87,000 new jobs. Uh next followed by leisure with

[24:15] 48,000 new jobs and then financial activities 13,000 new jobs. Those were the three biggest gainers. The biggest losers were business and professional services that lost 18,000. Manufacturing lost 8,000 and retail trade lost 6,500. It is interesting to note that uh overall the government sector lost a thousand jobs. We'll look into the details there. I suspect that we're still seeing job growth among local and state governments but that's being offset by reduction in jobs at the

[24:51] federal level. Okay. So looking at health care as has been the trend now for quite a long time. Most of the job growth in this sector is in health care and social assistance. Okay. Most most of the funding for these is driven by government spending which so you can see it continues uh to support these. There's only uh 8700 new jobs in private education but over 62,000 in health care and over 16,000 in

[25:26] uh social uh assistance. Okay. And you can see in health care uh you know large growth in ambulatory health care services and hospitals not as much in nursing and residential care facilities. Okay. And then in the next largest is in hospitality and leisure. So you can see in both arts and entertainment and recreation uh job growth over 16,000 and in accommodation and food over 31,000. So, as has been again the long-term trend, performing arts, spectator sports has seen a big increase, 7,000. Museums,

[26:03] historical sites shrank. That has that's again a longtime trend. And then amusement, gambling, um saw almost 10,000 new jobs. Okay. On the food and accommodations, so it's really food where we're seeing the big job growth. 30,000 accommodations, only about 1,200 new jobs in in May. So not a big source of growth there. And then finally, financial activities. So this is this is somewhat new. Uh financial activities has had kind of a mixed growth and shrink rate over over

[26:38] the last year or so. So finance and insurance saw 8,400 new jobs. Real estate, rental, and leasing over 4,000 new jobs. Uh and you can you can see where they are. So uh central money authorities uh central bank um you know actual job a little bit of job losses credit intermediation and related services 1,200 jobs uh securities commodities and such there's about 2,000 new jobs in finance and insurance 5,300. So pretty much uh with the exception of

[27:13] Money Center banks job growth across the board there. And then looking at real estate. So you can see uh real estate and rental and leasing services saw uh saw increases um less of non-financial intangible assets. This is like equipment leasing and such. I suspect no no growth there. But real estate looks to be doing pretty well. Okay. On the job loss front. So professional and business services big losses in administrative support and waste management. Businesses I think are

[27:49] tightening their belts. Okay. Also loss uh job decreases almost 2,000 in professional scientific and technical services. Management of companies and enterprises though have seen saw almost 5,000 net jobs created in May. Okay. So compare that to See was was this okay so you can see administrative support and support almost 22,000 jobs lost. So on the waste management side there was actually a little bit of an increase. So businesses

[28:24] are definitely tightening their belts. This could also be due to the adoption of large language models and other AIs that are allowing people to be more efficient without administrative help. Okay. So that's business and professional services manufacturing. Durable goods manufacturing dropped 7,000 and non-durable goods manufacturing dropped a thousand. This could be an outgrowth of the turmoil caused by the the the imposition of tariffs. Okay, where there was a lot of reports of manufacturers not being able

[29:01] to get the raw materials that they needed because of what was going on. And so they had to scale back on manufacturing. Now you can see machinery manufacturing uh was one of the big losers along with furniture and related and miscellaneous manufacturing and then non-mineral product manufacturing. Now there were some gains. So primary metal manufacturing saw a little bit. Fabricated metal and electrical equipment all saw gains of a little over a thousand jobs each. But the real news here is machinery manufacturing

[29:38] uh dropped by over 7,000 jobs. That's really what uh what what caused the overall drop in terms of non-durable goods. So food manufacturing actually went up as did textiles. But other than that, you can see everything else was down. So everything from beverage, tobacco and leather, plastics and rubbers, chemical, uh petroleum and coal, printing, paper, apparel and textiles all went down. So the only bright picture in employment in in non-durable goods manufacturing really is in food manufacturing. Okay. And then

[30:17] finally, retail trade. Okay. So you can see it's kind of mixed. So um motor vehicle and parts saw a little bit you know just a couple hundred job increase whereas building material and garden equipment lost 2600 food and beverage retailers gained 500 but furniture uh home furnishings electronics dropped 1,400. The biggest loss was in uh health and personal care retailers dropped 3,600 jobs. That's that was followed by building material and garden lost 2,600 and then sporting equipment and such dropped 2500 jobs. The biggest gainer

[30:54] was clothing. Now that's interesting because if you recall the uh the price of clothing has been decreasing year-over-year for quite some time and yet uh the number of people employed is going up. This could be retailers trying to offset price decreases by increasing the volume of sales. Okay. Now, construction has been a perennial gainer. It did get gain 4,000 jobs. Um and and you can see that uh specialty trade contractors actually

[31:30] dropped, but construction of buildings is indeed up 6,700. So, you you see kind of these two offsetting each other. Okay. And it's and you can see building both residential and non-residential increased. Okay. Now let's look at government real quickly. Okay. So and it's just as I predicted. Well, state governments were flat. Local governments uh hired 21,000 people and the federal government um basically let go 22,000 people. So one is offsetting the other. and and and you

[32:05] can see both for the postal service and the rest of the federal workforce, both of those dropped. Whereas in state governments, so you can see state government education dropped, but that was offset by gains in all the other areas of state government services. So you can see 20 2900 jobs dropped in education and picked up in uh in in uh non-education services and then uh let's look at the local government scene.

[32:40] Okay, so local government um so it was uh local government education dropped 300 jobs. We are heading into the summer so you're not going to see gains in in education hiring. Um and but but really where the growth is almost 21,000 new jobs in local government excluding education. So we'll probably continue to see this trend of essentially little to no uh job growth in government as the federal workforce uh contracts um and local government workforces increase.

[33:17] Now looking at the 12-month trend. So you can see that over the last year uh there was a gain of over uh 24,000 jobs. Uh I'm sorry, there was a gain in uh 270,000 jobs in government. Um but that's because um the impact of of the decrease in in federal jobs uh was only for the last few months. um and they were more than offset by uh increases in in government jobs at the state and local level. And

[33:52] you can see that again, you know, private education and health care services almost a million new jobs year-over-year. You can see again construction 126,000 new jobs year-over-year. Manufacturing has been declining uh year-over-year, 88,000. I know it's a goal of the president to reinvigorate manufacturing, but that's that's a very difficult thing to do here in the United States and we'll have to see how that plays out. Okay, so that's what's happening in various sectors and if you're considering making a job change, that's

[34:27] something to look at closely to see where is there opportunity uh in areas where where you have skills, experience, etc. Okay. Now, housing prices. So, looking at um California, the median sales price of a home in California, $859,000, down um uh you know, a roughly a tenth of a percent. So, essentially unchanged

[35:02] um from uh from the the year-over-year. Okay. The number of homes sold though has dropped almost 9% year-over-year. Average median days on market 31. Um that's up five year-over-year. Not a not a particularly significant change. Okay. And you can see this is a trend for all homes. Now, if we look at single family homes, excuse me, the the median home price is higher, 96,500 as opposed to uh condominiums where the median price is 655,000.

[35:38] Okay, so uh that's to be expected. Now looking at uh supply. So the supply of homes in California has actually increased 16% year-over-year. And that's what's probably kept the overall median home price from really having uh any kind of significant increase. Okay. And then Okay. So, homes sold above list price 40.3%. That's down almost 10%

[36:15] year-over-year. And of course, that's uh homes sold with a price drop 34.8% an increase of over 10%. Homes sold at list price um uh no that can't be right. 100%. Anyway, um you can see that the momentum is shifting a little bit. So, we're seeing more homes having to drop their prices to sell um and fewer homes sold above list price. And then finally, um where are people moving from in the

[36:50] United States and where are they moving to? Well, California is the most popular state for people to leave, followed by New York and Illinois and Washington. Uh and then from there you're looking at uh Virginia, Maryland, Massachusetts, uh Rhode Island and Connecticut, uh Indiana, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, uh Nevada, and and Colorado. Um uh sorry, Utah and Colorado. Okay, so those are and then where are they going to? Where they're going to? Florida,

[37:26] Arizona, the Carolas, both north and south, Tennessee and Texas and Idaho and Maine are the most popular places for people to to go to. Okay. Uh and so you can see where are people moving from between February and April of this year. more most people are are leaving Los Angeles, New York, Seattle, San Francisco, Washington DC, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, Denver, and Hartford. Okay? Although Denver and

[38:02] Hartford, we're talking, you know, very small numbers here, but very significant numbers of people are leaving LA, New York, Seattle, San Francisco, Washington DC, and Chicago. Where are people moving to? Sacramento, Phoenix, Coral, uh, Cape Cor Cape Coral, Florida, Orlando, Sarasota, Myrtle Beach, uh, and Jacksonville. So, you can see one, two, three, four of the top destinations are in Florida. And then there's there is one in California. Sacramento is less expensive than most other than most

[38:38] other major cities in California. Phoenix remains a popular destination. And Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, um, and Las Vegas. Okay. So, you can see where people are going. Now, let's let's look at see if we can find uh another market. Let's look at uh Omaha, Nebraska. Okay. So, looking at a a market very different from Los Angeles, Omaha, Nebraska. So, the median sales price in Omaha, $282,000, up 2.5%

[39:13] uh year-over-year. Uh number of homes sold five 525 down 7% median days on market 11. It's a very strong market and uh particularly among single family homes median days on market 10. Okay. And among cond but even among condominiums very strong market. So Omaha this is one of the ones I I look at you know typically on this show just to give you a a comparison. Okay, very very hot market. Okay, and you can see how hot is it? It's an 85. Okay,

[39:49] let's compare that to California. Where's the market heat indicator for California? Uh, it's interesting. They don't even show it for California. Um, so I mean, California is still a strong market, but not nearly as hot as um as as California. Okay. With, you know, 11-day turnaround. Okay. Um so uh sale to list price is close to 100%. Um homes sold above list price almost 40%. Homes sold with price drops about 34%. So um the market is cooling a

[40:27] little bit year-over-year um you know even in Omaha but still remains very strong. Okay. And what's happening in the market? So people are moving to Omaha from Kansas City, Missouri, Washington DC, Los Angeles, Denver, San Francisco. You can see all the top cities that people were are leaving. They're bringing in people uh you know, Omaha is is is gaining some of those locations. Okay. People are leaving Omaha for Milwaukee, De Moines,

[41:03] Madison. Here you go. Cape Cor uh Cape Coral, Florida, Phoenix, Sarasota. So again, some of the top destinations for people to go to nationwide. You can see even from Omaha, uh people are are are going there. So, uh you know, again, a very strong market. Let's look at one more. Let's let's look at let's look at where is the thing? Here we go. Let's look at uh Sarasota. I usually look at uh Miami, but let's look

[41:39] at Sarasota, Florida, which is uh one of the top inbound markets. So, you can see uh median sales price 499,000. That actually is a 15% drop year-over-year. Okay. Median days on market up 10% year-over-year to 81. So, although Sarasota is a top destination, it is cooling. Okay. And you can see how hot is it? 27. So it's not not a hot market at all compared to Omaha. Okay. Homes sold above list price only 5% with

[42:15] price drops 32%. Sale to list price 94%. Okay. So there is negotiating leverage in Sarasota. Okay. Where are people moving to Sarasota from? Chicago, New York, Miami. looks they're probably looking for less expensive housing. Boston, Washington DC, Philadelphia, Los Angeles. So again, Sarasota is a top destination for the cities that people are leaving. Where are people leaving Sarasota for? Um it looks like primarily what would be less expensive markets. Uh Knoxville and and Johnson City,

[42:51] Tennessee, Jacksonville, Florida, Asheville, North Carolina, Gainesville, Florida, uh Homoasa Springs, Florida. I don't even know what that is. But you can see they're they're not leaving for the major cities. They're staying primarily in the southeast. Uh e even Maryland is it could technically be considered in the southeast. Okay. So that gives you a picture of of what's happening with with housing uh in terms of for purchase housing. Now let's look at the rental housing market.

[43:27] Okay. And you can see that um you're we're looking at median rent in select markets. So uh Phoenix is trending down, Los Angeles is trending up, Dallas is up, Orlando's flat, Miami is flat, San Diego's up. So you can see in general, California rents are going up. Uh and same and in New York City, rents are going up. Um but in other markets um they are either flat or declining like Phoenix, Orlando, Miami, Atlanta, Georgia and Houston, Texas. So um formerly you know strong markets

[44:04] where people are moving to them. They are ameliorating uh somewhat um you know um now that that I think u you know things are just slowing down overall. So, let's look at Los Angeles in a little more depth. So, you can see that um the bulk of units available in Los Angeles are really in the 1,700 to 2,900 a month. Um and you can see the average rent is 2750. That's up $15 month over month. You can see that rents have been

[44:40] trending down, but now in the last month, they're trending back up again. Okay? whereas they were relatively flat last year and uh the market is warm. Okay, they're they're saying okay and and you can see for subm markets um Culver City is about flat, Leera Heights is continues to decline whereas View Park Windsor Hill is continuing to increase. Marina del Rey is about flat and Beverly Hills is continuing to increase. Okay. Now, let's go back and let's look at another market. Let's look at uh Miami.

[45:19] Okay. So, Miami um you know, similar range. Well, actually, yeah, about 1,700 to, you know, 3,800, but yeah, similar range to Los Angeles now, interestingly enough. However, and and rent in rents did increase $50 month over month. That's a pretty pretty big increase. You can see that uh rents trended down the second half of last year and and and and continued through February and now they've been trending back up to the point where um now they are getting closer to their

[45:56] peak last year. Their peak last year was about 3,300. They're now at about uh 3,200. So still $100 less but getting closer. It'll be interesting to see what happens in July. Okay. The market temperature in Miami is cool nonetheless. And then let's look at let's see if I can get uh let's look at Omaha. Oops. I'll learn how to spell. Okay, so Omaha, Nebraska. You can see um most rents are $2,200 or less. Um lot of

[46:34] units available starting at $700. So, however, big rent increase, $90 month overmonth. Average rent is $1,575. You can see that's a 6% or thereabouts increase. Uh, and you can see that rents last year trended up to about the $1,500 level and then started to decrease. They declined and they've gone up and down, but they stayed around $1,500 a month uh uh average rent. So, it looks like we're not going to see declines back to the lower levels that they were at the first

[47:10] half of last year. Okay. The market temperature though is is is cool. So, overall it appears the rental market nationwide is cool. But but nonetheless, um you know, you can see just like with house just like with for sale housing, uh rental housing in Omaha much much more affordable than it is in other locations. So, and you can go to Zillow Reynolds if you're thinking of moving. It's, you know, check it out. It's it's a great tool to use. Okay. The last thing we're going to look at is a survey of consumers. Okay. So, uh index of consumer

[47:47] sentiment. This is a big turnaround here. You can see month overmonth change increased 16%. So, uh the volatility of May, people have are are starting to leave that behind. um and they're getting more optimistic. So you can see the index went up to 60.5 from 52.2. Current economic conditions also saw an 8% uh increase. Okay. Uh month overmonth up to 63.7 from just slightly below 59. And the index of consumer expectations which

[48:23] is pro one of the most important indicators up almost 22%. people are much more optimistic now that the uh volatility from the the tariffs have seemed to have sort of uh fallen out of the news cycle. Now, you can see that there's still big changes year-over-year, excuse me. So, we're still below the index of consumer sentiment as of a year ago as and uh down 11% and down 16% in terms of consumer expectations from a year ago. Uh but if

[49:00] the current trends continue, we may see we we may see those year-over-year uh declines erased um as people, you know, become more optimistic. So now you can see by the way that these are consumer expectations etc. This is for 2018 through 2020. They were you know very very high and they've been and they dropped considerably uh after COVID. They started to come back up in late 2020 but as of 2021 they

[49:36] dropped to um you know very low level. they they went up and down but did recover somewhat um and then they dropped again the first part of this year but now they are headed back up again. So uh that's you know that's a consumer expectations do play have a big impact on what actually happens because people act in accordance with their expectations and so uh so that's a good sign. Uh so among the good trends is year ahead inflation expectations dropped from 6.6%

[50:14] last month to 5.1% this month. That means people are less concerned about inflation. Okay. Long run inflation expectations fell for the second straight month uh down just a tiny bit in June to 4.1% from 4.2's percent. But these are the lowest in in three months. Okay. Um so we are seeing uh consumers being more optimistic um um you know this month than they have been really since the start of the year and that's that's a a a good sign for

[50:51] things going forward. So I I don't know about you, uh I'm a little bit more comfortable now that the some of the volatility has calmed down and so uh uh you know am hoping that this trend will continue and you know 2025 will turn out to be uh a good year. So that's what I've got for you on economic echoes. I hope you find this uh information useful. Uh if you have any questions, comments, criticisms, uh my social media uh links will be in the show notes when

[51:28] this episode posts on LinkedIn, I mean on on YouTube. So feel free to put to drop them there. And let's see, uh tomorrow at 5:00 PM is my every other week show, Jiggers's Place. We're going to sit back and have a cocktail and talk about the classic detective Sherlock Holmes and the man who wrote the Sherlock Holmes stories, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. So, I invite you as we head toward the end of the week to uh to relax with me tomorrow afternoon. And then on Sunday at 10:00 a.m. is a

[52:04] special edition of the Way to Wow Show in honor of the anniversary of the establishment of the Pledge of Allegiance. So, that'll be Sunday, June 22nd at 10:00 a.m. I hope you'll join me for that special show. And then next week, um, Monday at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time is my show, Trust and Estates Weekly. My guest is Here we go. My guest is Derek Keller. He's going to be talking about business exit planning. And then on Tuesday at 10:00 am, my guest is Darren Burrell.

[52:41] And he is a an Air Force veteran turned venture capitalist. And so um Darren is going to is going to share the lessons that he learned from the military that he applies to his work as a venture capitalist. And then one week from today, we'll be back. I'll be back for the next edition of uh people making money. So I thank you very much for joining me. Wish you a wonderful rest of the day and signing off. Marie darling, you are my bell.