US new home sales fall slightly short of forecasts in July

New home sales in the US fell short of forecasts in July amid a sharp increase in prices.

Sales of new single-family homes in the States declined by 1.7% month-on-month in July, hitting an annualised clip of 627,000, according to the Department of Commerce .

The consensus forecast had been for an annualised pace of sales of 650,000.

Offsetting that miss to an extent, the estimate for the prior month had been revised higher, from a preliminary print of 631,000 to 638,000.

Yet prices continued to rebound, with the average price of a new house jumping from $369,500 in June to $394,300 for July, their highest level since December 2017.

Sales were weakest in the Northeast, where the annual pace of sales fell by 52.3% versus the prior month to reach 21,000 and in the South, where they decreased by 3.3% to 355,000.

The supply of homes available for sale meanwhile increased to 5.9 months' worth of sales, which was up from 5.7 months in June and the highest level since August 2017.