and as diana olick reports, business is growing. >> reporter: just after a foot of snow fell on syracuselow driver jeff deline got on this app to pick up his next job. >> this is a job that i accepted. it shows the driveway size, three to five cars. >> reporter: deline is using plows and mows, an app that like uber delivers a plow to your door in less than an hour. >> we set out to develop this company actually after my mom of all people, you know, was stuck in her driveway and couldn't get out. >> how are we doing with the providers right now? >> reporter: 33-year-old co-founder wills mahoney says the app makes it easy for both homeowners and drivers to streamline service and payment. it is now in 30 markets, including chicago, cleveland, and boston. mahoney says he has angel funding and is raising more to expand the app's reach. >> once the job goes out it gets dispatched to the closest provider. so these guys are already going on their own route, and they're picking up jobs right within their existing route. they're basically getting money they never would have had before, and we pay

for "nightly business report" i'm diana olick in cleveland. >> and to read more about how restaurantsurban development head to our website, nbr.com. >>> coming up, performance art. literally. meet the artist who trades stocks and is using the recent market machinations as her medium. ♪ ♪ >>> when you invest in a stock of course you track its performance. now one artist is using her investments to generate art. you might call it performance art. robert frank introduces us to the woman who's transforming her studio into a kind of stock exchange. >> reporter: for investors the stock charts of the past two weeks have been painful to look at. but for artist sarah mayojas they are a thinking of beauty. a 24-year-old rising star of the art world, she's taken over a manhattan gallery for an unusual performance piece. trading stocks and turning their movements into paintings. it's a comment on what really drives stocks and how stocks drive our economy and culture. >> the financial markets have just grown in size and importance over the last 25 years in such a phenomenal almost sublime way. tha

diana olick lists just a few of them. >> reporter: gun legislation looms large in 2016 on both sides.as will become an open carry state for handguns, a practice banned since the civil war. it already allows openly carrying rifles and shotguns. this makes it's largest open carry state. california, florida, illinois, new york, and south carolina still ban it. meanwhile, california restricts toy guns, requiring all realistic-looking air guns or bb guns to have more distinguishing features like colorful trigger guards so police can tell the difference if confronted with one. speaking of toys or vehicles, you decide. california is regulating hoverboards. a new law restricts use in public places, limits speeds to 35 miles per hour, and requires safety equipment. be warned. riders must be at least 16 to ride in public places, and it will be illegal to hover under the influence of drugs or alcohol. and to health for humans and animals. hawaii becomes the first state to raise its minimum age from 18 to 21 to buy or use cigarettes or e-cigarettes. and illinois is making it a misdemeanor to leav

diana olick runs the numbers. >> reporter: more than 5 million u.s.omeowners could be leaving cash on the table. that according to a new report from reese, inc. with rising home equity, more borrowers are now eligible to refinance. nearly 2.4 million could save $200 or more per month. and almost 2 million more could save between $100 and $200 a month. add it up and that's $1.2 billion in monthly savings being left on the table. if rates go up just half a percentage point from where they are now, 2 million borrowers fall out of the running. a full percentage point and it's 3 million. the remaining pool of potential refi candidates would be the lowest number in recent history. and that's why borrowers may want to act now and not just to refinance but to take out a home equity line. reese ran the numbers and found that the amount of home equity available to be capped is now up to 4.2 trillion collectively. that's up 600 billion over last year. obviously, lenders are more strict on these loans nowadays than they were during the last housing boom, when bor

diana olick takes a look at housing, but first, phil lebeau on autos. >> reporter: it's the tale of two worlds. stock markets around the globe are hitting the brakes. but in the auto industry, business is still accelerating. in fact, global sales this year are expected to hit another all-time high, thanks to increases in china, europe and the u.s. today president obama celebrated the resurgence of america's auto industry while touring the detroit auto show. >> because today factories are humming, business is booming, the american auto industry is all the way back! >> reporter: so far, buyers have shrugged off talks of the economy slowing down. auto sales historically move in tandem with consumer confidence, which remains high. housing starts are increasing, which is expected to help demand for pick-ups. and auto loan interest rates remain relatively low. all of this convinces leaders in the auto industry that business should stay strong, even as they see weakness in stock markets around the world. phil lebeau, "nightly business report," chicago. >>> call it the up side to the sharp down

for "nightly business report," i'm diana olick in washington. >>> the drugmaker eli lilly issues a weakinancial outlook where we begin tonight. the company cited are impacts from foreign exchange as well as analysts differing revenue expectations. on the upside, it said it does expect r&d spending to be higher than last year and it has nine late stage drugs in its pipeline. shares of the drugmakerer up to 84.11. gilead's shares rose after the fda granted it a priority review for experimental help c treatment. they once made up a majority of gilead's sales but competition has been eating into revenue. shares of the company up more than 1% on the day in the 99.26. spirit airlines chief executive steps down and company shares step up. he had been in the job since 2006. he gets credit for keeping ticket prices low while boosting fees. shares rising almost 6% today to 41.50. >>> meantime, three major carriers increased air fares. delta raised fees by up to $4 one way. southwest and american increased ticket prices by $3. shares of delta fell slightly to 48.57, southwest rose. and american ai

for that, diana olick, d.c. how does it look, diana? rick, existing home sales jumped 14.4% month to month to an existing annual rate. that's the largest monthly sales jump in history, but, wait, there's a reason. you remember that huge nearly 11% drop in november. this is all because of new mortgage rules that went into effect in november and delayed a lot of closings and pushed them to december. so it's really a wash. the realtors are saying that today's data was just confirming the november drop was due to delays in those new mortgage regulations. we do have full year numbers for 2015. total sales, 2.56 million. prices up 6 minnesota 7%. for december t median home prierks $224,100 up 7.6% year over year, the realtors calling that very unhealthy. inventory is your headline here. 1.79 million units for sale. that's down 3.8% year over year. we're at a 3 president 9 month supply. that's the lowest in a decade the retore is saying. they're saying there's a housing shortage in the cards for the spring buying season. if you don't get more

diana olick.ust 0.1% in december, but that's from a downwardly revised november reading. it basically comes out to flat in the wash. that is a miss. the street was expecting a bigger gain than that. sales up 4.2% year over year. pending home sales are the measure of signed contracts in december not closings. it's a forward-looking indicator of closing. why the flat pending home sales? realtors say it is no homes for sale. the ability to find homes in affordable price ranges is difficult for buyers in many job-creating areas. home building is grossly inadequate. again, sounds like a broken record, but lack of supply hurting home sales. we heard it from pulte group ceo this morning in their quarterly earnings release which was better than expected. he said builders are benefitting from such tight supply. regionally it was the northeast was the only region seeing gains up 6.1% month-to-month. that is probably due to warmer than average temperatures in december. the rest of the country saw pending hom

let's bring in diana olick.lows down as it has according to a real estate developer we talked to earlier today we are also coming off of record years. what are you hearing on the ground about real estate and oil and texas. >> yeah, i mean, it's so interesting because as you said houston was really an amazing difference compared to the rest of the country for such a long time. it was record high prices, record high sales and the weakness we really began to see mostly on the high end but now we are starting to finally see it trickle down. the problem is the home builders pushed prices more than the resale market so they have a lot more trouble ahead. some of the builders you talked about, we actually listened closely on the conference call to what they're saying and maritage homes says they are seeing a spike in cancellation rates. so, again, the weakness is coming for the builders a lot more than in the existing home market. >> yeah, and for investors also what you hear is you have to look on the fringes, those m

diana olick has that. >> the street was looking for 62, the sentiment came in at 60.om a reading high of 65 in october. we should be seeing sentiment improve given that mortgage rates are low and we're coming into the spring market, though you couldn't tell today. home builders are using words like gradual and modest to describe the recovery. of the three components of this monthly index, current sales conditions were up two points to 67. that was the only increase. sales expectations over the next six months, down three points, to 63. current buyer traffic down two points to 44. that up with still mired in negative territory. 50 is the line on this index between positive and negative territory. all regions were down. northeast, midwest, west down. southbound two points, the west is still showing the highest in home builder confidence at 75. >> bit disappointing there. china's gdp slowing to a 25-year low, that's raising hopes for more stimulus from beijing. eunice yoon is there live. is that realistic? >> that's the big question mark a lot of people are wondering. we

dia dia diana olick what do you see inside the numbers? >> these are signed contracts in december.n i'm making this point is that we saw big drops, and then a big jump in existing home sales due to mortgage regulations, closing delays that pushed sales up into december. this is based on signed contracts, people shopping in a warmer than usual december and signing contracts. we saw from the dr horton on monday saying they had good traffic and a lot of people coming in at the end of the year. what's interesting here is the median price of a newly built home, 288, $900. that's down. why is that important? price is everything now. affordability, even though we have lower mortgage rates than in a while, people are still looking at price. and they're seeing that existing home prices are rising considerably. so builders, if they can pull that price back, they'll see the sales. that's what we're seeing in these numbers. inventory will be important because existing home inventories are very low, but dr horton says they have a lot coming on the market for this spring. this is a good read. ba

diana olick joins us now. this is a very regional thing though, isn't it? >> it absolutely is, but it could be the first sign nationally that the red hot apartment market is losing a little steam. this is the first two quarter rise in six years which calls this a turning point in the national apartment market. new construction is beginning to outpace demand, but it's mostly on the high end. that's why rent growth isn't cooling nationally. still up 4.6% from a year ago. but let's go local so you key what i mean. new york city, which, of course, commands the highest rent in the nation averaging $3,400 a month has rising vacancies and rent growth below the national average. san francisco, the second priciest rental market at $2,400 a month has vacancies flat. rental apartments are still hot in atlanta, miami, and d.c. with vacancies falling and rents still rising. salt lake city, charlotte, and portland, oregon, are the top three in biggest rent jumps. developers tell me it is robust construction of all the high-end rental buildings that's cracking the market.

diana olick joins us. made interesting comments today about what is and what isn't selling. what did he say? >> michelle, cheap works, plain and simple. revenue growth may have been slower, but david alt couldn't say enough about the company's entry level express homes brand. he said it is the driver of market share gains at dr horton, expanding the brand rapidly to southern california. strong in texas, the carolinas and florida. express was launched in early 2014 as others like palte focused on high end. express touts a no option, no frills house for between $100,000 and $200,000 depending on location. this is below the national median price. and he said dr horton is seeing slower movement on its luxury emerald brand and even its midlevel core horton brand not seeing as much demand as express. steven east said on squawk on the street this morning that dr horton is way ahead of the other builders on the entry level. and said his research shows others are starting to move toward entry level, given the deman

diana olick has more. >> hi. there is an app for everything. so why not plows.rofits after barely three years in business. some have deemed it the uber or gl grub hub of snowplows. you decide. >> we offer snowplowing, across the country in over 30 markets. you download our app plow z and now z and it gets dispatched out to our providers. >> mahoney came up with the idea when his mom got stuck in her syracuse driveway watching plows go by. now he has angel funding and is raising more. he gives drivers extra revenue paid to them almost immediately through the app. last winter when boston was getting pummelled but syracuse was dry, they had drivers road trip east and pick up boston jobs immediately. critics say it takes the personalized customer service but you could upload pictures and special instructions for orders. unfortunately the app does not exist here in d.c. yet. mahoney said he hasn't signed up enough drivers to ensure quick service. but we call the local plow company, due to this incredible storm bearing down on us and we called them yesterday to inquir

diana olick is tracking that. >> rates made a big move overnight and experts say you do not see this kind of move in mortgage rates very often. the popular 30-year fixed loan has come down from above 4% last week now to some lenders at 3.75% for the best borrowers. that's according to mortgage news daily. in -- it is especially a big deal heading into a holiday weekend when you know there will be a lot of open houses and hungry buyers out there. most home buyers expected rates to move up this year, so this adds a lot of urgency to house hunters out there now. these low rates allow them to buy more house which is crucial given how few listings there are out there and how competitive the market is right now. of course, market volatility does hurt especially if some borrowers are relying on equities or options tied to the market to finance their purchase. now, for some market volatility may actually outweigh the lower rates. back to you. >> thank you very much, diana. take a look behind me. lots of red with the dow down by 450 points right now. it was down by over 500 in earlier trade.