Sept. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Home values in 20 U.S. cities climbed in July by the most in almost four years, helping stem the record plunge in household wealth that’s depressed spending.
The S&P/Case-Shiller home-price index rose 1.2 percent in July from the prior month, the biggest gain since October 2005, the group said today in New York. Another report showed consumer confidence unexpectedly fell in September, while holding above the record low reached earlier this year.
Home values are rebounding as low borrowing costs and government tax credits lift home sales. Combined with rising stock prices, the gains will begin to restore the $13 trillion plunge in net worth caused by the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, a process that economists such as Brian Bethune say will take years to complete.
Home prices are “a major, major turning point for the economy,” said Bethune, chief financial economist at IHS Global Insight in Lexington, Massachusetts. “We are eating away at the problem of household balance sheets.”
The New York-based Conference Board’s consumer confidence index fell to 53.1 in September from 54.5 the prior month, the private research group said today, amid growing concern over the lack of jobs. The gauge sank to 25.3 in February, the lowest level in data going back to 1967.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index dropped after the confidence report, erasing earlier gains, and closed down 0.2 percent at 1,060.61 in New York. The yield on the benchmark 10- year Treasury note was little changed at 5:15 p.m. in New York from 3.28 percent late yesterday.
Decline Slows
From a year earlier, the S&P/Case Shiller index was down 13.3 percent, less than economists anticipated and the smallest decrease in 17 months.
The measure was forecast to fall 14.2 percent, according to the median projection of 36 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. Estimates ranged from declines of 12.5 percent to 15 percent. It was down 15.4 percent in the 12 months ended in June.
Compared with the prior month, 17 of the 20 cities covered showed an increase, led by a 3.1 percent jump in Minneapolis and a 2.9 percent increase in San Francisco. Las Vegas suffered the biggest one-month decrease at 1.9 percent.
Sales Rising
Combined sales of new and existing homes have risen for four out of the last five months, signaling the worst of the housing crisis is over.
The Obama administration’s $8,000 tax credit for first- time buyers, which is due to expire at the end of November, combined with lower prices as foreclosures soared, have helped lift sales this year. The National Association of Realtors and the National Association of Home Builders have lobbied to extend the credit on concern demand will wane after it lapses.
Karl Case, co-creator of the S&P/Case-Shiller index, said the U.S. residential property market is improving enough to end the tax credit for first-time buyers.
“We’ve got to phase back incentives and this may be a good time to do that,” Case said in an interview on Bloomberg Radio. “I believe in some cities you’ll see the beginning of recovery.”
Pending Profit
Lennar Corp., the third-largest U.S. homebuilder, is among companies that see demand improving, even as losses mount. The Miami-based company said last week it expects to turn a profit in fiscal 2010.
“In the third quarter we started to see some real signs that the housing market is in fact starting to stabilize,” Stuart Miller, Lennar’s chief executive officer, said on a Sept. 21 conference call. “The sense that now is the time to buy is starting to gain momentum.”
The Conference Board’s confidence gauge was projected to increase to 57, according to the median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News.
The decline was caused by growing pessimism over jobs. The share of consumers who said jobs are plentiful fell to 3.4 percent this month from 4.3 percent. The proportion of people who said jobs are hard to get increased to 47 percent from 44.3 percent.
“It’s a little hard for households to look at their paychecks, or the lack thereof, and feel more confident,” Ellen Zentner, a senior economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York, said in a Bloomberg Television interview. Even so, “we should continue to see consumer confidence turn around,” because the recession is over and hiring eventually will rebound, she said.
Fewer Job Losses
The pace of job losses is easing as the economy shows signs of accelerating. Payrolls fell by 216,000 in August, the smallest decline in a year, according to the Labor Department. Employers probably cut another 180,000 workers this month, economists project a Labor Department report later this week will show.
Economists say the Conference Board’s index tends to be more influenced by attitudes about the labor market.
Confidence may improve in future months as balance sheets rebound. Net worth for households and non-profit groups climbed by $2 trillion in the second quarter, marking the first gain since the third quarter of 2007, according to figures from the Federal Reserve.
Fed policy makers last week said they would keep the benchmark lending rate near zero “for an extended period,” and noted that sluggish income growth and tight credit are curbing household spending and slowing the pace of the economic recovery.
To contact the reporter on this story: Bob Willis in Washington at bwillis@bloomberg.net; Shobhana Chandra in Washington at schandra1@bloomberg.net
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