Make sure you understand what the article is suggesting here, because there's more to it than the headline: > U.S. homebuilding increased in June by the most i

Make sure you understand what the article is suggesting here, because there's more to it than the headline: > U.S. homebuilding increased in June by the most in nearly four years amid reports of rising demand for housing in suburbs and rural areas... > Still, homebuilding remains 24.3% below its February level. The South and the West accounted for about 75% of housing starts last month.... > Demand for housing is being supported by cheaper mortgage rates. The 30-year fixed mortgage rate is at an average of 2.98%, the lowest since 1971, according to data from mortgage finance agency Freddie Mac... > But a resurgence in new coronavirus infections across the country eroded consumer sentiment in mid-July, other data showed on Friday, threatening the nascent housing and economic recovery. Some areas in virus hot spots in the populous South and West regions have either shut down businesses again or paused reopenings. This is a good article which talks about a lot of the context here: money is cheap, we started re-opening more in some places, construction picked back up in those places. Even with this things are slower than in the winter, and the current recovery is tenuous due to the increasingly obvious need to put the brakes on reopening plans as the virus continues to spread.