U.S. light vehicle sales at General Motors and Chrysler plunged more than 40 percent in November, while Ford's sales dropped 31 percent, battered by an economic storm that has sent consumer demand for new vehicles to lows not seen in decades.

GM's sales fell 41 percent, while Chrysler's dropped 47 percent.

Their overseas rivals posted abysmal results Tuesday as well.

Toyota's November U.S. sales tumbled 34 percent, while Nissan's dropped 42 percent and Honda's fell 32 percent.

Like retailers of other big ticket items, automakers have taken a beating in recent months as worries about the economy and unemployment have prompted consumers to slash spending.

At the same time, some people afraid that they won't qualify for credit or that it will be too costly have put purchases on hold.

Massive drops in auto sales. How can the Big Three possibly survive?

Auto Makers Report Sharply Lower November Sales

U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she believes either Congress or the Bush administration will step in to aid domestic automakers because bankruptcy is “not an option.”

Looks like we don't really have an "option" except to sit back and watch the pathetic process of the government trying to spend its way out of being broke.

Dec. 2 (Bloomberg) -- House prices in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Guangzhou are plunging, and the global economy may grind almost to a halt next year because of it.

Construction of homes, offices and factories fell at least 16.6 percent in October after rising 32.5 percent a year earlier, according to Macquarie Securities Ltd. That's squeezing an economy already slowed by recessions in the U.S., Japan and Europe that have cut demand for exports. Building is the biggest driver of China's expansion, contributing a quarter of fixed- asset investment and employing 77 million people.

How does the old saying go? If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make it a sound? After attending the Grizzlies/Hawks game last night in Atlanta, I feel like I've come up with the basketball equivalent to that phrase: If an NBA game is played, but there is nobody there to see it, does it really count?

I knew the NBA was having attendance problems, but seeing last night's crowd at Philips Arena, or lack thereof, makes me believe that the NBA's issues are more severe than I originally thought.

By Dennis Cauchon, USA Today

Rick Wallick moved into a new, three-bedroom $200,000 home in Maricopa, Ariz., in October 2005. Today, the home is worth $80,000.

The disabled software engineer stopped making mortgage payments this month. His $70,000 down payment is now worthless. His dream house will be foreclosed on next year.

[snip]

As painful as the decline has been, history suggests home values still may have a long way to drop and may take decades to return to the heights of 2½ years ago.

"We will never see these prices again in our lifetime, when you adjust for inflation," says Peter Schiff, president of investment firm Euro Pacific Capital of Darien, Conn. "These were lifetime peaks."

The boom in home prices — fueled by heavily leveraged loans built on low or even no down payments — made it easy to forget that housing values had been remarkably stable for a half-century after World War II, rising at roughly the same pace as income and inflation. Prices soared in most of the country — especially in Arizona, California, Florida and Nevada and metro areas of Washington, D.C., and New York — during a brief period of easy lending, especially from 2002 to 2006. That era's over.

So far, home values nationally have tumbled an average of 19% from their peak. As bad as that is, prices would need to fall as least 17% more to reach their traditional relationship to household income, according to a USA TODAY analysis of home prices since 1950. In that scenario, a $300,000 house in 2006 could be worth about $200,000 when real estate prices hit bottom.

The price plunge has wiped out trillions of dollars in home equity and caused the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. Susan Wachter, professor of real estate at the University of Pennsylvania, fears that foreclosures and tight credit could send home prices falling to the point that millions of families and thousands of banks are thrust into insolvency.

Prices will plunge further as job losses sap demand, foreclosures add to the property glut and prospective buyers get turned away by mortgage lenders. The Federal Reserve this month cut its benchmark interest rate target to as low as zero and said it would take more steps to ease borrowing as the longest postwar recession looms.

“November sales just collapsed,” said Chris Low, chief economist at FTN Financial in New York. “Price declines are accelerating. As bad as this is, it’s going to be considerably worse in a month’s time.”

Toll's building revenue cut in half
Luxury homebuilder Toll Brothers Inc. said revenue dropped 51 percent, according to preliminary results, in the fiscal first quarter.

The Horsham, Pa., company anticipates taking between $100 million and $200 million in pre-tax writedowns for the first quarter, though it is still making a final calculation. Toll (NYSE: TOL) offered no guidance and expects to report final results March 4.

Its preliminary results were down across the board. Revenue was $409.3 million. Backlog was $1.04 billion, down 56 percent.

Signed contracts were $128.1 million, a 66 percent drop.