There's news on the economic front today that sheds light on the housing market.

The first news is the existing home sales for March. The numbers show a drop of 8.4% over February's numbers. This is the largest drop in 18 years, taking us back to the really ugly real estate market of 1989.

The second piece of economic data just out is the consumer confidence numbers. The number declined for the second month in a row. Much of the reason for the decline seemed to have to do with gas prices at the pump. And that is certainly a factor in our local housing market.

Remember that these are national numbers. Real estate is local, local, local! Our solds actually increased here, March over February. That's true in every county I looked at in the area. That includes, Fauquier, Culpeper, Prince William, Warren and even little Rappahannock! That's the good news. The bad news is that we're down year over year and inventory once again increased in March.

The other interesting thing about these numbers on a national level is that there are a number of analysts saying that the numbers were down in March because of bad weather in February. Since our February was really ugly from a weather perspective and we still managed higher numbers in March, I'm a little cynical about that explanation!