Shop ‘til your thumbs drop!

According to an annual survey from the National Retail Federation, 200.4 million people did some shopping from Thanksgiving Day through Cyber Monday. That’s nearly 4 million more than last year and 18 million more than expected. Most of the increase was among online shoppers, who totaled 134.2 million. But Small Business Saturday drew a majority of retail activity ($59M) to brick-and-mortar stores. Get more numbers from the NRF report.

Number Talk: Confluence of Economic Indicators

The three charts below show how real estate market cycles generally move in sync with other economic indicators such as financial markets, employment, and consumer confidence.

It’s important to note that these data points end in 2019 and don’t reflect the crazed volatility created by the global pandemic. As we’ve all seen, the housing market has experienced a complete rebound, but some economic sectors are still struggling to recover.