| National Economists See New Home Sales Improving in 2009 |
| Written by Jonathan Smoke | |
| 10.22.2008 | |
Discuss this article on the forums. (0 posts)  An esteemed group of economists and analysts took turns presenting views and forecasts for housing today at the National Association of Home Builder’s Construction Forecast Conference in Washington, DC. While they all pointed to significant problems and risks still abounding in the market, most pointed to the bottom of new home sales being reached by the end of this year or during the coming winter.If you missed the conference you can still access copies of the slides that were presented from the NAHB web site. David Seiders, the Chief Economist for NAHB, started the conference with a view that seemed to be the consensus. New Home Sales would reach bottom by the end of this year and would start a gradual improvement in 2009. The major caveat highlighted by Seiders and others is that the lack of financing for residential construction and development loans may limit any improvement in production and sales in 2009. And Seiders noted that “the risks seem to be piled up on the downside.” The various risks discussed were numerous and serious: tight credit conditions; rising unemployment; foreclosures continuing at very high rates for some time; high historic levels of vacant homes; and home prices continuing to decline as much as 10% or more in many markets. Additionally, the view of what’s happening right now was extremely negative and dire. Sales are clearly at very low levels, and based on the market malaise in September and October, the stats we’ll hear through the rest of this year are likely to be even worse. I’m trying to absorb the views that I heard expressed at the conference. I also want to dig through some of the facts and figures that were presented. For now I will summarize the event as a sobering day of presentations, but I find it quite ironic that the consensus is for improvement in sales in the months ahead. 
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