High prices turn off buyers, Toll Brothers finds

According to Wall Street Journal real estate blogger Kris Hudson, luxury builder Toll Brothers reported that new orders for the quarter ending July 31 amounted to 1,324 homes, a 6 percent decline when analysts were expecting a 10 percent gain. Toll’s case underscores a challenge that the U.S. home-building industry at large is facing, which is, as Hudson puts it, that “aggressive price increases in the past two years have hobbled demand at a time when builders finally are ramping up supply. “