In September, buyers remained cautious with buying, many holding back, unsure as to where the market was going. Having previously rose 7.4% in August, the Pending Homes Sales Index, dropped 4.6% in September, leveling out at 89.2. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) says this was due to a drastic price decline, which dropped 9% from September of the previous year to September 2008.

Lawrence Yun, the chief economist for NAR, says that "Right now, we're in a recession, and unemployment will increase through 2009,...Consumer spending has halted and businesses are very cautious of expanding. It is unclear by how much the global economic slowdown will dampen U.S. exports, which had been rising strongly." Yun feels that the economy will continue to fall, with the gross national product tightening at the end of 2008 and 2009´s first quarter. Yun also remarked that "The depth of the recession depends entirely on housing,...With sufficient housing stimulus, the recession will be shallow. If government actions stay focused on housing, the cost to the Treasury would be much less that the potential losses in the nation's output and income in a severe recession."

Others are not quick to panic as the National Bureau of Economic Research is not going as far as to declare a recession, and their definition of what constitutes a recession is the most overall accepted.