KB Home says encouraged with recent order trends

CEO Jeffrey Mezger says: "Our strategic goal continues to be a monthly absorption pace of between 4 and 5 net orders per community, which we think we will achieve for the second quarter resulting in a projected range of between 3,000 and 3,700 net orders. At the midpoint, this will represent a net order decline of 14% year-over-year. Our backlog at the end of the first quarter stood at over 7,000 homes valued at over $3.3 billion. This position will continue to provide consistency in deliveries and margins and supports our revenue projection for the year. During the quarter, we started 1,500 homes and ended the quarter with roughly 7,400 homes in production, of which 77% are sold. We are ramping up our starts in the second quarter as we continue to balance starts with sales and as we look ahead to year-end deliveries."