Home-buying plans, confidence slide in Sept.
By Furniture Today Staff -- Furniture Today, October 6, 2003
New York — Consumers are scaling back plans to buy homes and big-ticket items, according to The Conference Board, whose latest survey also indicates that consumer confidence in September fell back to July levels after rising in August.
The September survey found that 2.9% of consumers planned to buy a home in the next six months, compared with 4.1% in August. September's figure is a 13-month low for home-buying plans.
Six-month buying plans for cars dipped 1.2 percentage points in September from August, and major appliance purchase plans dropped 5.8 percentage points from August.
Overall, the Consumer Confidence Index dropped nearly five points in September from August and now stands at 76.8.
The Expectations Index fell 6.5 points to 88.4 and the Present Situation Index slid 2.5 points to 59.5.
Five of the nine U.S. regions were up in September from August. The largest increase, 8.3 points, was recorded in both the West South Central and West North Central regions. The East South Central region experienced the greatest plunge, dropping 19.9 points to 64.6 in September.
Lynn Franco, director of The Conference Board's Consumer Research Center, said, "The lack of improvement in labor market conditions continues to dampen consumers' spirits. Despite September's retreat, consumers remain cautiously optimistic about the outlook for the next six months. Consumer spending is likely to continue at or near current levels."
The Consumer Confidence Survey is based on a representative sample of 5,000 U.S. households.
