UPDATE 1-Standard Pacific posts quarterly loss

(Adds outlook, details)

NEW YORK, Feb 1 (Reuters) - Standard Pacific Corp. (SPF.N), a builder of homes primarily in the western United States, posted on Thursday a quarterly net loss versus a year-ago profit as it took hefty charges and revenue fell on slower home sales.

The company also said 2007 earnings per share and revenue could be lower than 2006 on declining home deliveries. A housing market slowdown has led to cancellations and bloated inventories across the industry. Standard Pacific made a fourth-quarter loss of $98.4 million, or $1.53 a share, compared with a profit of $154.9 million, or $2.22 a share, in the year-earlier quarter.

The latest quarter included a non-cash pre-tax impairment charge of $2.73 per share for real estate inventories, the write-off of option deposits, costs for abandoned projects and other items.

In October the company had forecast fourth-quarter earnings of 90 cents to $1.00 per share, before additional inventory impairment charges or write-offs of deposits and capitalized pre-acquisition costs for abandoned projects.

Homebuilding revenue fell to $1.2 billion from $1.3 billion in the year-earlier quarter but was slightly ahead of its October guidance for revenue of about $1.1 billion.

Deliveries of new homes fell 13 percent to 3,083 from 3,558 last year and net new home orders in the quarter fell to 1,296, down 40 percent from a year ago.

It forecast 2007 earnings of $1.75 per share on homebuilding revenue of $3.2 billion to $3.3 billion based on 8,700 new home deliveries.

The outlook does not include potential inventory impairment charges, or write-offs of land deposits and pre-acquisition costs for abandoned projects, the company said. "If general or local market conditions deteriorate further, or our competitors change their pricing strategies, we may have to further reduce home prices or adjust our discounts and concessions which may in turn trigger additional impairments," Chief Executive Stephan Scarborough said in a statement.

Standard Pacific posted full-year 2006 earnings of $1.85 per share, including $3.54 per share after tax for items such as inventories. Its 2006 homebuilding revenue was $3.9 billion. The company forecast first-quarter earnings of 25 cents per share on revenue of $600 million and about 1,650 new homes.

((Reporting by Sinead Carew, editing by Braden Reddall; Reuters Messaging: sinead.carew.reuters.com@reuters.net; +1 646-223-6186)) Keywords: STANDARDPACIFIC RESULTS/

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