Released today, the December 2020 LegalShield Economic Stress Index™, a suite of leading, near real-time indicators of the economic and financial status of U.S. households and small business, saw its Housing Construction Index spike to an all-time high. Building activity is expected to remain strong in the first quarter of 2021. Concurrently, the Housing Sales Index reached an all-time high in December, indicating that demand for homes should sustain existing home sales into 2021. Those with existing resources are driving the housing expansion, while the recent stimulus package is helping to tamp down consumer stress among households whose finances have been most impacted by the pandemic.
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(Graphic: Business Wire)
“Millions of Americans who have fared well financially over the last 10 months remain eager to spend more on housing in 2021. Many are working from home for the foreseeable future, have been able to save money, and want to improve upon and expand their immediate, daily surroundings,” said Jeff Bell, LegalShield CEO. “On the opposite side of the expanse are approximately 12 million renters who, at January’s end, will owe nearly $6K in back rent and utilities, reflecting the K-shaped recovery that has become evident in the U.S. economy.”
Highlights from the December 2020 LegalShield Economic Stress Index™ are as follows:
The LegalShield Economic Stress Index™
The LegalShield Economic Stress Index™ is comprised of five sub-indices -- Consumer Stress, Bankruptcy, Foreclosure, Housing Construction and Sales -- constructed from the company’s proprietary data, which reflect the demand for various legal services over the past 15-plus years. Each of the five sub-indices were selected because they tend to lead an existing economic indicator that sheds light on the health of the U.S. economy (i.e., the target economic indicator). Each time a provider law firm, in all 50 states, receives a request from a customer, the request is logged as an “intake” in one of roughly 70 unique areas of law (e.g. - real estate) depending on the nature of the request. The company on average receives 80,000 intakes per month from its 1.8 million memberships, including individuals and small businesses, a statistically meaningful sample. In this way, the data provides actionable intelligence about the near-term direction of the U.S. economy. Keybridge LLC, a boutique economic and public policy consulting firm based in Washington D.C., is responsible for independently compiling and analyzing the LegalShield data and developing the accompanying economic narrative.
About LegalShield and IDShield
A trailblazer in the democratization of affordable access to legal protection, LegalShield is the world's largest platform for legal, identity, and reputation management services covering more than 4.4 million people. Its IDShield identity theft solution for individuals and families has more than one million members. LegalShield and IDShield serve more than 140,000 businesses. In addition, over 34,000 companies offer LegalShield and IDShield plans to their employees as voluntary benefits. Both legal and identity theft plans start for less than $25 per month. For more information about LegalShield, visit: https://www.legalshield.com or for more information about IDShield, visit: https://www.idshield.com/.
Source: LegalShield v. Housing Starts (December, 2004 – December, 2020)
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Jennifer Gaglione
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