U.S. home builders lift your prospects

Article Excerpt

The U.S. housing construction and improvement markets have recovered strongly from the lows they hit at the start of the pandemic in March 2020. In fact, they have gone on to new highs. That growth includes a big jump in late 2023. That rise was spurred by ongoing pent-up demand for housing. Many people who own a home right now don’t want to sell because they have a low-rate mortgage and don’t want to reset it at a higher rate. As a result, new home sales have climbed even as existing home sales have slumped to multi-decade lows. Here we look at two ETFs that aim to benefit from the increasing demand for new housing in the U.S. (see the supplement on page 29 for more information on the U.S. housing market). ISHARES U.S. HOME CONSTRUCTION ETF $102.12 (New York symbol ITB; TSINetwork ETF Rating: Aggressive; Market cap: $2.4 billion) tracks the Dow Jones U.S. Select Home Construction Index. Pure homebuilding companies make up 66% of…