WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Sales of previously owned U.S. homes slipped last month and the backlog of unsold properties hit a record high, according to data on Friday that suggested the market’s downturn still has a long way to run.
Home resales fell 1 percent in April to a 4.89 million-unit annual rate, the National Association of […]

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WASHINGTON - U.S. home prices posted their sharpest first-quarter decline since the government began tracking the data 17 years ago.
The Washington-based Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight said Thursday that home prices fell 3.1 percent in the first quarter compared with last year. The index also fell 1.7 percent from the fourth quarter of 2007 […]

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A growing belief that property prices are falling is deterring both sellers and buyers, leaving UK housing-market conditions at their loosest since the mid-1990s, according to a survey published today.
Confidence in the outlook for house prices has plunged in the past month, the monthly report by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics) shows.
Ninety-five per […]

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LONDON (MarketWatch) — British mortgage lender Nationwide on Wednesday said house prices fell for the sixth consecutive month, adding to the gloom over the U.K. housing market.
House prices saw a monthly decline of 1.1% from March, and were down 1% compared to April 2007, marking the first annual price decline since 1996. The drop brought […]

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WASHINGTON (AP) — A reading of U.S. homebuilders’ sentiment remained unchanged in April, just shy of its record low for the third consecutive month as the housing market failed to recover.
The National Association of Home Builders said Tuesday its housing market index came in at 20 this month, the third-lowest reading on record.
The index, derived […]

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(Money Magazine) — With home values tumbling and the mortgage market still in crisis, you’d think that Billie and Rodney Wylde would shelve their plans to build their North Carolina dream home - at least until the market stabilizes.
Not a chance. The thirtysomethings are set to pour the foundation on a 2,100-square-foot farmhouse with a […]

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WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — In the clearest suggestion yet of a recession, U.S. nonfarm payrolls fell by 63,000 in February, the second straight decline, the Labor Department reported Friday.
“Turn out the lights the party’s over,” wrote Joseph Brusuelas, U.S. chief economist for IDEAglobal. “We are in a recession.”
It was the largest drop in payrolls since March […]

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The Wall Street Journal reports from California. “As home prices plummet, growing numbers of borrowers are winding up owing more on their homes than the homes are worth, raising concerns that a new group of homeowners, those who can afford to pay their mortgages but have decided not to, are starting to walk away from […]

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