INSTANT VIEW: U.S. existing home sales pace fell in March

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The pace of sales of existing home in the U.S. fell 3.0 percent in March to a sharply lower-than-expected 4.57 million-unit annual rate, the National Association of Realtors said on Thursday.

KEY POINTS: * Economists polled by Reuters had forecast home resales to slip to a 4.70 million-unit pace, from a revised 4.71 million rate for February. * The inventory of existing homes for sale fell to 3.74 million from the 3.80 million overstock reported February. * The median national home price rose 4.2 percent to $175,200 from February, boosted by seasonal factors. However, prices fell 12.4 percent compared to the same period a year ago.

COMMENTS:

LAWRENCE WHITE, PROFESSOR OF ECONOMICS, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY'S STERN SCHOOL OF BUSINESS:

"We still have a rocky economic climate and the major macro economic indicators are still moving down. Households are worried about their income and employment. Before stepping forward to make what is usually the biggest purchase commitment they will ever make, people need to feel more secure in terms of their economic future and their jobs. The fact that home prices went up is largely irrelevant. The data on a month-to-month basis is largely noise and it is really the long-term trend that is more indicative of the market."

JACOB OUBINA, CURRENCY STRATEGIST, FOREX.COM, BEDMINSTER, NEW JERSEY:

"The report is pretty weak across the board. We had home prices falling at 12.4 percent from last year. This sort of throws some cold water on the notion that home prices were bottoming after yesterday's better-than-expected report. The yen crosses overall should be heavy on data like this because stocks have dropped pretty dramatically right after the numbers came out. There's still no bottom in sight in the U.S. housing market."

PIERRE ELLIS, SENIOR ECONOMIST, DECISION ECONOMICS, NEW YORK:

"The existing home sales report does establish that sales have stabilized in a range, but at a lower level than where we were last summer. The pace of sales took a step down in the fall and we have not recovered, but given the employment and income backdrop, we're doing pretty well. The Fed has pulled out all the stops and the Treasury has pulled out all the stops and they seem to have kept sales from falling further despite ongoing severe job losses. Everything is relative now. The inventory remains quite large and there hasn't been much progress on that front."

CUMMINS CATHERWOOD, MANAGING DIRECTOR, BOENNING AND SCATTERGOOD, WEST CONSHOHOCKEN, PENNSYLVANIA:

"Let's face it, this economy is still pretty darn weak. Almost any benchmark that you expect to see is very likely to be either disappointing or slightly disappointing or slightly better than expected because we're bouncing along some kind of bottom here. It's very, very hard to predict this stuff as everybody is finding."

TIM GHRISKEY CHIEF INVESTMENT OFFICER, SOLARIS ASSET MANAGEMENT, BEDFORD HILLS, NEW YORK:

"I think that and the pending GM news is sort of hanging on the market. The home sales were a bit below expectations but not hugely. To me it's more the GM overhang that seems to be weighing on the market. Then just probably some profit-taking here, earnings were pretty good overnight. We're still seeing weakness in revenues and strong earnings can't go on forever, you need revenue growth at some point here.

"It just looks like profit-taking and perhaps anticipation of some major events coming out of GM at some point. Perhaps, we didn't hear it, but maybe there was whisper for more improvement in existing home sales, clearly we didn't get that.

"The number is below economists expectations by 1.7 percent. It wasn't a big miss but clearly a disappointment to a market that is clearly expecting better numbers coming out of the housing market to help continue the recovery in the financial markets. We clearly didn't get that this morning."

GARY THAYER, SENIOR ECONOMIST, WACHOVIA SECURITIES, ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI:

"Home sales were a little weaker than expected. It still shows that the housing market may be bottoming. It's been holding within a range, but it's a very low range. Unfortunately, there's no sign yet of a recovery though you have the conditions for a recovery with low mortgage rates and very affordable prices."

SCOTT ANDERSON, SENIOR ECONOMIST, WELLS FARGO, MINNEAPOLIS:

"We got a drop from last month's gain. We are still in a bottoming cycle for home sales. We are still a few months away from a bottom. Inventories are still above historical norms. We don't expect national home prices to bottom until next year. We are tantalizingly close to a bottom in sales. We've seen a drop in mortgage rates which has helped sales."

PETER BOOCKVAR, EQUITY STRATEGIST, MILLER TABAK & CO, NEW YORK:

"The data shows a market that still remains somewhat in the doldrums. We've seen weak purchase data and this shows weakness outside of foreclosures.

"The market did fall a little after the numbers came out. I can't say what's going to happen for the rest of the day, but I think the market is going to be more focused on the stress test than just this number."

JOSEPH TREVISANI, CHIEF MARKET ANALYST, FX SOLUTIONS, SADDLE RIVER, NEW JERSEY:

"Down again. It looks like the housing market has not yet bottomed and this will not be good for the U.S. dollar".

MARKET REACTION: STOCKS: U.S. stock indexes add to losses BONDS: U.S. Treasury debt prices pare losses DOLLAR: U.S. dollar pares gains versus yen