Toll Brothers CEO: Traffic is "worst we've ever seen"

It looks like Manhattan is still one of their stronger markets, plus Westchester and CT, but overall the housing crunch is taking its . . . Toll. I'll be here all week.

In its release, Toll Brothers said the average price of contracts signed in the quarter was $590,000, down from $711,000 a year earlier and $634,000 in the fiscal first quarter.

Robert Toll said current customer traffic is "the worst we've ever seen," but noted that potential buyers are well-qualified, with an average credit score of 747.

That's a hell of lot of price chopping, with more to come. We will soon see a marked slowdown in residential and commercial building, and we need to start planning for infrastructure projects to help smooth out the disruption in the jobs market. We really, really need to start investing in our transit and utility infrastructure, and soon we're going to need the jobs too.
H/T Calculated Risk (best finance and economics blog on the planet).

UPDATE: Brooklyn market has "faded". I saw in comments elsewhere that the Toll CEO had given the Brooklyn market an "F", but I haven't been able to confirm that yet so please take it with a grain of salt.

Toll gave most U.S. home markets poor grades, saying Southern California and Illinois are `F-,' Arizona an `F,' and New Jersey a `C.' He said the New York exurbs earned a grade ``B+'' and that sales in the city borough of Brooklyn have ``faded.''