From the National Association of Manufacturers comes an update for October on economic indicators in the US:

* Existing home sales fell 4.1% to 3.79 million units at the annual rate in October, the lowest since August 2010, according to the National Association of Realtors. With sharply higher mortgage rates, homeowners are less willing to sell their existing homes, limiting inventories for sale.

* Single-family home sales declined 4.2% to 3.38 million units, and condominium and co-op sales declined 2.4% to 410,000 units. On a year-over-year basis, existing home sales plummeted 14.6% from 4.44 million units in October 2022. The median sales price was $391,800, up 3.4% from one year ago and a record for an October reading.

* On the housing front, mortgage rates have fallen in recent weeks after jumping to the highest level since November 2000 on Oct. 26. With rates pulling back slightly, demand should stabilize moving forward.

* Durable goods data for October provided mixed news, highlighting both the challenging economic environment for manufacturers but also some lingering resilience.

* After rising 4.0% in September, new durable goods orders dropped 5.4% in October, declining from $295.41 billion to $279.44 billion. Yet, these data were skewed by shifts in transportation equipment, with large declines in nondefense aircraft and parts, which can be highly volatile from month to month, and from strikes in the motor vehicle sector.

* Excluding transportation equipment, new durable goods orders were essentially flat, up from $187.35 billion to a record $187.37 billion. Through the first 10 months of 2023, new durable goods orders have decreased 0.9%, but with a gain of 1.6% year to date with transportation equipment excluded.

* Orders for core capital goods-a proxy for capital spending in the U.S. economy-edged down 0.1% to $73.79 billion, pulling back for the second straight month from the record $73.95 billion in August (while remaining not far from that level). Core capital goods orders have risen 1.1% year to date.

* The week ending Nov. 18 saw 209,000 initial unemployment claims, a five-week low. Meanwhile, the week ending Nov. 11 saw 1,840,000 continuing claims, down from 1,862,000 for the week ending Nov. 4, which was the highest since the week ending Nov. 27, 2021. While continuing claims reflect some cooling in recent weeks, the overall labor market remains strong overall.

The Index of Consumer Sentiment dropped from 63.8 in October to 61.3 in November, the lowest reading since May, according to final data from the University of Michigan and Thomson Reuters. Consumers felt less upbeat about both current and future economic conditions, with “a notable deterioration in expected business conditions.”

High school students’ scores on the ACT college admissions test have dropped to their lowest in more than three decades, showing a lack of student preparedness for college-level coursework, according to the organization that administers the test. Scores have been falling for six consecutive years, but the trend accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic.