U.S. home sales up, but still slow

WASHINGTON - Sales of U.S. new homes recovered in April after slumping in the previous two months. But Americans are still buying new homes at a slower pace than they did a year ago.

The Commerce Department said Friday that sales of new homes rose 6.4 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 433,000. That compares with an upwardly revised annual pace of 407,000 in March, when purchases fell 6.9 percent. Buying had dropped 4.4 percent in February, in part because of winter snowstorms.

Demand for newly built homes remains one of the missing pieces of the nearly 5-year-old recovery from the Great Recession. Sales of new homes are running at roughly half the rate of a healthy real estate market.

Warmer weather has yet to heat up the housing market after a harsh winter slowed sales in January and February.

New homes usually represent about 20 percent of all homes sold. That figure has fallen recently to 10 percent, according to real estate data firm Zillow.

An index of builder confidence for this month fell a percentage point to 45, the National Association of Homebuilders and Wells Fargo reported Thursday. A reading below 50 indicates that builders consider the conditions for new construction to be poor. The index had been above 50 from June through January.