Slow increases in activity in fields such as travel and shipping, which were previously at historic lows, but are now showing some movement back to positive numbers.
Truckstop.com, which looks at demand in trucking’s spot market, shows an 18 percent rise in available loads as of the week ending May 18 and said demand has been rising for each of the past four weeks, according to the WSJ.
Meanwhile, there have been more travelers passing through TSA gates as of late, with 267,451 travelers logged as of May 24. That number is nearly three times the low point of 87,534 on April 14, although overall, the numbers are still far from what they were in the pre-pandemic days.
The real estate market, likewise, is seeing an uptick, with a 27 percent spike as of May 24, up from its lows earlier in the pandemic, according to real estate tracker ShowingTime. Mortgage applications have also trended upwards in recent days.
San Francisco real estate agent Justin Fichelson said the spike in real estate likely comes from the amount of time people are spending at home.
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“People are realizing, ‘I need a great place to call home,’” he said, according to WSJ. Low interest rates haven’t hurt that cause, either.
Though there will still be hurdles — the unemployment rate is historically high, with many jobs that are unsure to come back. Recent figures say there are 38 million Americans on unemployment, with millions of new applicants each of the previous several weeks.
And a second round of the virus has not been ruled out yet, with no one able to give a sure answer on what will happen in that regard and medical experts saying it’s a possibility that the virus will hit again in the winter.
