Home, Retail Sales Keep Sliding

The housing market continued to plunge in the first quarter of 2008, as single-family sales dropped 22% from their year-ago pace, to 4.95 million annually. Bloomberg reports that the median home price is off 7.7% from a year ago, to $196,300, as foreclosed properties drag down values. Meanwhile, US retail sales were off in April, mainly because of a big drop in autos.

Vehicle sales were down 2.8%, the Wall Street Journal reports; but stripping data from carmakers out, sales of other retail items increased by 0.5%—beating analysts' expectations of a 0.3% increase and showing that the economy, outside of housing, might be regaining some strength. (More retail sales stories.)