“The housing recovery is absolutely going to be measured in years, not in months”

From Reuters:

November home builder sentiment at record low

Home builder sentiment stayed at a record low in November, weighed down by a record supply of unsold homes lingering on the market, an industry group said on Monday.

The National Association of Home Builders said its preliminary NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market index was unchanged at 19 in November, matching last month as the lowest reading since this gauge started in January 1985.

“The housing recovery is absolutely going to be measured in years, not in months,” said Sue Woodard, executive vice president of Mortgage Market Guide, a real estate market information service in Holmdel, New Jersey.

With foreclosures on the rise and many banks forced to write off billions of dollars in losses on subprime loans, borrowers are having a harder time getting funding.

The rise in unsold inventory is attributed to potential buyers cancelling orders as the market worsens as well as increasingly tight-fisted lending practices.
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“Consistent with what builders said in last month’s survey, many are reporting that their special sales incentives are having limited success in terms of getting buyers in the door,” NAHB President Brian Catalde, a home builder from El Segundo, California, said in a statement.
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“It looks grim,” said Ron Litt, president of Market Kinetix in Houston, Texas, which analyzes borrower credit scores.

“The underwriting standards now for mortgage loans are so strict that credit’s not really the killer,” he added. “It’s mortgage lenders demanding higher reserves, perfect documentation on employment history and salary, they want money down — the day of the 100 percent loan is pretty much gone — and people are having more trouble qualifying for loans on those grounds than they are on credit grounds.”
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The November builder sentiment index is less than half what it was at the year’s peak of 39 in February, and well below the 33 reading in November 2006.

The unchanged November reading follows eight straight months of declines in the index.

“The message from today’s report is that builders do not see any significant change in housing market conditions as compared to last month,” NAHB Chief Economist David Seiders said in the statement.

“While they continue to work down inventories of unsold homes and reposition themselves for the market’s eventual recovery, they realize it will be some time before market conditions support an upswing in building activity — most likely by the second half of 2008.”