Cramer on BloggingStocks: Horton doesn't get it

Jim Cramer — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 09:09:00 EST

Filed under: Market Matters, Centex Corp (CTX), D.R.Horton (DHI), Freep't McMoRan Copper (FCX), Stocks to Buy, Stocks to Sell, Housing, Cramer on BloggingStocks

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says they should be punished for trying an end run on taxpayers.

Love Centex (NYSE: CTX) (Cramer's Take), sell Horton (NYSE: DHI) (Cramer's Take)? That's how I feel after reading Horton's pathetic plea to bring back down-payment assistance for this industry, which remains unpunished for all it did to foment the housing crisis.

Yesterday, in one of our "Wall Street Confidential" series, I opined that Centex was shaping up to be one of the better builders after making so many right moves in the last year to preserve capital. I didn't care for industry leader D.R. Horton, though.

And that was before I read the outrageous comments from Horton CEO Don Tomnitz in Market Watch yesterday, where he decried that the new housing law didn't include more down-payment assistance loans from the FHA. These seller assistance loans plied basically, by the homebuilders that allow homebuyers to use a back door to FHA loans, have been defaulting at very high rates. The Congress, in an actual dollop of wisdom, scrapped them and instead gave people a tax credit of $7,500 to buy a new house, not bad considering that houses have retreated in value to the point that even though you need to put down more money as a percentage basis, as an absolute basis there's some affordability. This kind of loan is precisely what got us in trouble, an affordable loan that people ultimately couldn't afford that just helped Horton dump properties.

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Cramer on BloggingStocks: Horton doesn't get it originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 06 Aug 2008 09:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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2007 will suck, all 12 months? So says DR Horton CEO

Sarah Gilbert — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 17:39:00 EST

Filed under: Bad News, Management, Television, D.R.Horton (DHI)

Were you watching CNBC after the market close today? If so, you may be cancelling your plans to sink all your home's equity into a big remodel. In an unusually frank and sober prediction, D.R. Horton, Inc. (NYSE:DHI) CEO Donald Tomnitz told the audience of millions of market watchers that "2007 is going to suck, all 12 months."

David Gaffen from the Wall Street Journal's MarketBeat blog was watching, and he wonders if it's not just a reaction to D.R. Horton's not-exactly-stellar stock performance. Though only down a penny today to $24.55, the stock is off 20% since its February 2, 2007 high near $31 -- a rough month, indeed.

The good news (sort of)? Tomnitz thinks 2008 will be better. Not good. Better than the suck-icious 2007, at least. Is this a case of let's-give- the-worst-case-projection-and-hope-no-one-blames-me-when-it- happens? Or is it really true? Either way, the homebuilder's stock isn't doing any better since his words; it's down over a percent in after-hours trading.

I, for one, won't bail out of the market but I think I'll wait to refinance... with this kind of talk, the only thing I see on the horizon is cheaper interest rates. And I'm certainly not going to hire Donald to run pep rallies anytime soon.

2007 will suck, all 12 months? So says DR Horton CEO originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 07 Mar 2007 17:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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