Today Lennar Corp., the second-largest U.S. homebuilder, posted its earnings for the second quarter — a net loss of $244.2 million in the three months ending May 30:
“As we look to our third quarter and the remainder of 2007, we continue to see weak, and perhaps deteriorating, market conditions,” Stuart Miller, chief executive, said in a statement.
That breaks down to nearly $3 million per day, calculates Peter Viles, the blogger at the LA Times’ real estate blog.
Last year for the same quarter, the company earned a profit of about $325 million.
Lennar’s not alone among homebuilders seeing losses. The Commerce Department said today that new home sales nationwide were down in May.
In September, we found that a local Lennar office had switched its break room coffee from Starbucks to Folgers, and that catered lunches had become once-a-month pizza day in light of the uncertain market. Now, nearly a year later, we wonder if even Folgers has become a distant memory.
Click here to see a map of Lennar’s projects in San Diego County.