FYI, also April existing home sales figures will be published tomorrow and Case-Shiller figures next Tuesday. First Quarter U.S. Home Prices Tumble 3.1 Percent, Ofheo Says 2008-05-22 10:14 (New York) By Bob Ivry and Kathleen M. Howley May 22 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. house prices fell 3.1 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier, according to a government report. Prices for previously owned... [more]
FYI, also April existing home sales figures will be published tomorrow and Case-Shiller figures next Tuesday.
First Quarter U.S. Home Prices Tumble 3.1 Percent, Ofheo Says
2008-05-22 10:14 (New York)
By Bob Ivry and Kathleen M. Howley
May 22 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. house prices fell 3.1 percent in the first quarter from a year earlier, according to a government report.
Prices for previously owned single-family homes also fell an average of 1.7 percent from the fourth quarter of 2007, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, known as Ofheo, said today in Washington.
Potential buyers are waiting for falling prices to hit bottom, causing the inventory of unsold properties to swell. People who are ready to buy face difficulty obtaining financing as lenders have tightened lending standards and cut back on the number of mortgages they are writing.
``It's a dismal picture, there's no way around it,'' said Paul Kasriel, chief economist at Northern Trust Corp. in Chicago.
``A complicating factor is the fact that so many homeowners owe more on their mortgages than their houses are worth. This is a financial crisis. You can't put lipstick on this pig.''
The number of mortgage originations is expected to drop 18 percent this year from 2007, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.
Almost two-thirds of U.S. banks have raised standards for mortgages to their most creditworthy borrowers, and three-fourths made it more difficult for people with limited or tainted credit to get loans, according to a Federal Reserve survey of senior loan officers published May 5.
Foreclosures rose to an all-time high at the end of 2007 as borrowers with adjustable-rate loans walked away from properties before their payments increased, the Mortgage Bankers Association said in a March 6 report.
--Editors: Rob Urban, Peter S. Green
To contact the reporters on this story:
Bob Ivry in New York at +1-212-617-5157 or bivry@bloomberg.net.
Kathleen M. Howley in Boston at +1-617-210-4625 or kmhowley@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story:
Rob Urban at +1-212-617-5192 or at robprag@bloomberg.net
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