US house prices continue to plunge by a record amount, a new report showed on Tuesday, adding to pressure on consumers and threatening to prolong a domestic economic slowdown reports the Financial Times.

Meanwhile, confidence among US consumers fell to its lowest level in five years as shoppers reacted to the impact of the housing slump, tighter credit conditions and a weakening labor market.

The Standard & Poors/Case Shiller 10-city index of single-family house prices contracted by 13.6 per cent year-on-year in February, the most since records began in 1987.

The broader 20-city index fell 12.7 per cent compared with a year earlier, the biggest drop since the index’s inception in 2001.

Monthly price declines have accelerated, with repeat sale prices in the 20-city index falling by 2.6 per cent in February, compared with 2.4 per cent in January and 2.1 per cent in December.

The worst affected cities were Las Vegas and Miami where home values have respectively fallen 22.8 per cent and 21.7 per cent in the past 12 months. In San Francisco house prices fell 5 per cent in just one month between January and February.

“Prices of single family homes continue to drop across the nation,” said David Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at S&P. “There is no sign of a bottom in the numbers.”

Falling house prices and soaring foreclosure rates have become a major brake on US growth; causing homeowners and lenders to realize big losses and forcing banks to book write downs totaling more than $230bn.

Read it here: Fall in US house prices accelerates