Builder Standard Pacific Reports 48% Quarterly Decline

Blaming the sluggish Southern California real estate market, Costa Mesa home builder Standard Pacific Corp. reported Friday that its net income dropped 48% for the first quarter.

Standard Pacific, California’s fifth-largest home builder, reported net income of $573,000 or 2 cents a share, down from $1.1 million or 4 cents a share, for the same period last year. Sales fell 8.3% to $70.9 million from $77.3 million for the same time the pervious year.

“This raises some concerns. It’s surprising that revenues are down, given that their backlog orders were up last year,” said Stephen Percoco, an analyst with Lark Research in Rahway, N.J. “Still, the rest of the year could be better.”

Percoco said he was encouraged that Standard Pacific’s home building divisions recorded a 60% increase in orders of new homes for the quarter. The company had 536 new orders in California and Texas, compared to 327 orders during the same time last year.

“Traffic is up and demand for our housing has increased. We’re keeping our fingers crossed that interest rates don’t increase in 1996,” said April J. Morris, a vice president of finance for Standard Pacific. “The real estate market has been hit during the past few years and last year we had a loss. So we were pleased with our results.”

Standard Pacific reported a net loss of $27.4 million, or 90 cents a share, for 1995, which included a $46.5-million noncash pretax charge required by a new accounting rule.

The company’s stock dropped 12.5 cents a share to $6.62 a share in New York Stock Exchange trading Friday.