new sales contracts on existing homes fell a seasonally adjusted 7.7% in January amid job losses

Pending U.S. home sales sank to a new record low in January as economic woes turned buyers away from the staggering housing market.

Supply of unsold homes rises to record-high 13.3 months
Despite a record drop in prices, sales of new homes fell 10.2% in January to a record-low seasonally adjusted annual rate of 309,000, the Commerce Department estimated Thursday. Sales were down 48.2% compared with a year earlier, the government reported, an indication that the downturn in the housing market was still accelerating as the recession headed into its second year.

The index is now down 6.4% from a year earlier, the National Association of Realtors said.
"We expect similarly soft home sales in the near term, but buyers are expected to respond to much improved affordability conditions and from the $8,000 first-time buyer tax credit" in the stimulus package, said Lawrence Yun, NAR's chief economist, in a statement.
January's pending sales rose more than 2% in the West. Elsewhere, pending sales fell, declining almost 13% in the Northeast, almost 12% in the South, and more than 9% in the Midwest.
The Tuesday report points to weak upcoming sales data, wrote Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist with High Frequency Economics, in a research note.
"It will be awful, the only question is the degree of awfulness," Shepherdson wrote.
In December, the pending home sales index rose 4.8%, compared with a prior estimate of a 6.3% gain.
The index is based on signed sales contracts, which usually occur a month or two before the sale is closed, when sales are reported in the NAR's existing-home sales report.
Even with many serious potential home buyers on the sidelines waiting for passage of the stimulus bill, job losses and weak consumer confidence were a natural drag on home sales," Lawrence Yun, the Realtors chief economist, said in a statement.

A combination of higher food and utility bills, falling house prices

Many people have seen bills eat into their income
Households have less spare cash
Household finances have been squeezed by an "abrupt" change in circumstances in the past year, according to a survey for the Bank of England.

A combination of higher food and utility bills, falling house prices and scarcer credit have reduced household budgets and spending.

Nearly 2,500 households were interviewed for the survey in late September and early October.

Typically, they said they now had less spare cash either to spend or save.

"The typical household reported that the income it had available after meeting household bills had fallen over the past year and that it had saved less than it had expected," said the Bank.

Changing circumstances
The Bank's report said that, after a period of steady growth and low inflation, the last year had seen a sharp turnaround in the finances of British households.

More than half of those who took part in the survey had seen a decline in their available income after paying tax, debt repayments and utility bills.

A rise in mortgage costs for some borrowers earlier in the year, when they had come off fixed or discounted mortgage rates, had also played a part.

However, the financial situation of many households has changed since the survey was carried out in late September and early October.

About 40% of households have a mortgage and most of these will see their borrowing costs cut sharply because of the Bank of England's successive rate cuts in October, November and December.

These cuts have taken the official bank rate down from 5% to just 2%, with many economists expecting further reductions as the impending economic recession in the UK deepens.

£1.6 trillion debt
The Bank's survey reveals that total household debt in the UK has now reached £1.6 trillion, when mortgage debt is added to unsecured debt such as credit cards, overdrafts, hire purchase agreements and other personal loans.

And the survey has also found that more than 50% of all households now have some sort of unsecured debt.
The most exposed landlords were the 6% of landlords with high loan-to-value ratios on their main residence


However, the reluctance of banks and other lenders to extend much further credit, except at high rates of interest and to the most credit-worthy customers, is clearly contributing to the downturn in consumer spending.

In the survey, 16% of households said they were worried they might not be able to get any more credit, up from 12% who said this in 2007, and that this was causing them to defer their spending plans.



"Some households had been put off spending by tighter credit conditions, and more households were finding their debts to be a burden than in similar surveys carried out since the mid-1990s," the Bank said.