Existing home sales fall unexpectedly in March 2012 for 3rd time in past 4 months

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4/19/12, "U.S. Previously Owned Home Sales Unexpectedly Fell in March," Bloomberg

"Sales of previously owned U.S. homes in March unexpectedly fell for the third time in the last four months, showing an uneven recovery in the housing market.

Purchases dropped 2.6 percent to a 4.48 million annual rate from 4.6 million in February, the National Association of Realtors reported today in Washington. The median forecast of economists in a Bloomberg News survey called for an increase to 4.61 million. In January, sales at a 4.63 million rate were the strongest since May 2010.

Residential real estate remains the economy’s soft spot, challenged by stricter lending standards, lower home values and the threat of more foreclosures. An improved labor market and mortgage rates near historic lows have yet to stoke bigger gains in demand....

Another report today showed more Americans than forecast filed for unemployment benefits last week, a sign improvement in labor-market conditions may be stalling. ...

The number of previously owned homes on the market fell to 2.37 million in March from 2.4 million the month before, today’s report showed. At the current sales pace, it would take 6.3 months to sell those houses, the same as in February....

Purchases declined in three of four U.S. regions, led by a 7.4 percent drop in the West. They declined 1.7 percent in the Northeast and 1.1 percent in the South. Sales were unchanged in the Midwest....

A measure of housing affordability a month earlier climbed to a record 206.1, according to the Realtors data. A value of 100 means that a family with the national median income has enough to qualify for a median-priced property....

Investors accounted for 21 percent of purchases last month, down from 23 percent in February, today’s data showed. Such figures suggest the recovery in housing isn’t broad-based, said Jay McCanless, a housing analyst with Guggenheim Securities LLC in Nashville, Tennessee.

“We’ve seen investors and cash sales continue to be anywhere from 20 percent to 33 percent of monthly sales,” McCanless said. “That may be giving the appearance that there’s more activity, more demand for housing than may actually be the case.”

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