Luxury home builder Toll Brothers said it expects to report a 19% drop in home-building revenue.
The company said preliminary results showed that home-building revenue fell to $1.09 billion in its fiscal first quarter.
The value of the contracts Toll signed during the quarter fell 34% to $749 million, and the backlog of homes on order and waiting construction fell 30% to $4.15 billion.
The company is reviewing its writedown assessment for the quarter and predicts that they will be at least $60 million, but may reach $160 million or more.
"Things may be looking up," Chairman and Chief Executive RobertToll said. "It appears that the pace of cancellations is starting to abate," Toll said.
"First quarter FY 2007 cancellations totaled 436 versus 585 in fourth quarter FY 2006 and this quarter's cancellation rate of 29.8% was lower than the 36.9% cancellation rate last quarter. However, we are still well above the company's historical average of about 7%," he said.