DETROIT — Earlier predictions that the housing market would recover early next year seem all too rosy now after months of struggles in the subprime mortgage market and a cascade of foreclosures.

David Seiders, chief economist with the National Association of Home Builders, cut his forecast for 2008 and now expects housing to pick up in 2009 nationwide after hitting bottom in the middle of next year.

"It's awfully fair to say the year ended up much weaker ... 15 percent below what I expected at the beginning of the year," Seiders said on a conference call Friday.

"For 2008 as a whole, I am looking at an overall down year." Seiders said the overall economy is slowing in the fourth quarter and it has hit a rough patch where the probability of a recession has increased quickly. He expects home prices, which have fallen 5 percent this year, to drop by 10 percent to 15 percent from the peak in 2005.

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