Job Claims Rise, Home Sales from Foreclosure Listings Fall
April 24th, 2009 by 
Joseph Smith
In March, sales of pre-owned homes, including homes in forclosure lists, declined by 3 percent, according to data from the National Association of Realtors.
The data showed existing-home sales declining to an adjusted yearly pace of 4.57 million housing units. The decline was only slight, compared to drops in home sales in the last months of 2008 and in the first months of 2009.
Wachovia economist Adam York commented the decline was bad news, but the slight decline was a positive sign.
The number of homes in foreclosure listings remains high in March, and home sales are still driven by sales from foreclosure listings. Both these factors continue to push down home prices. Sales from foreclosure listings last month represented about 50 percent of existing-home sales. The median price for existing homes was $175,000 a decline of 12.4 percent from the median price in March 2008.
NAR said first-time home buyers comprised about half of the buyers of existing homes in March, as they were attracted by lower mortgage rates and lower home prices.
York and other economists are encouraged by home purchases from first-time buyers, but they are still concerned about the ten-month backlog of unsold new homes, pre-owned homes and homes in foreclosure listings.
Meanwhile, reports from the Labor Department show that businesses continue to lay off workers and that these dismissed workers are unable to find other jobs.
Jobless claims increased last week, as the number of laid off workers increased in March from February levels.
For the week April 6-11, about 6.1 million jobless Americans were filing for jobless claims, an increase of 100,000 from the prior week. Initial job claims increased to 640,000, an increase of 27,000 from the prior week.
Economists working with Goldman Sachs Group observed that the average of initial jobless claims dropped from 651,000 to 647,000 and commented that it is a positive sign, although not definitive.
Additionally, data from the Labor Department showed that there were 2,933 mass layoffs in March, rising by 164 mass layoffs from February levels. Most of the mass layoffs occurred in manufacturing enterprises. With one mass layoff equivalent to at least 50 employees laid off, more than 300,000 workers lost their jobs in March, many of them losing their only source of money to keep their homes from being added to foreclosure listings.
