A home for sale in San Francisco, California, 21 Jul 2009A real estate industry group says the U.S. housing market appears headed for a recovery.

TheNational Association of Realtors (NAR) said Thursday sales ofpreviously owned homes jumped faster than expected in June, rising 3.6percent.

The group says it is the third month in a row thatsales have increased, with the rate of homes sales now at its highestlevel since October.

Many economists say the collapse of theU.S. housing market helped trigger the financial crisis. But thelatest U.S. government report on unemployment is doing little to easeconcerns.

The U.S. Labor Department says the number of Americansfiling first-time claims for unemployment benefits last week rose by30,000 to 554,000. At the same time, the total number of workerscontinuing to file jobless claims fell to about 6.2 million, the lowestit has been since April.

Officials caution the numbers arelikely distorted for the second week in a row because of the recentlayoffs at two of the three top U.S. auto companies.

Employersin the United States have cut 6.5 million jobs since the recessionbegan in December of 2007 and the country's unemployment rate recentlyhit a 26-year-high of 9.5 percent.

White House Budget DirectorPeter Orszag said Wednesday officials expect the unemployment rate "toremain stubbornly high" even when the economy improves. And FederalReserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told lawmakers Wednesday the country'srising unemployment rate remains the biggest threat to the economy.

Thehead of the U.S. central bank also warned that American consumers willlikely be changing their shopping habits - buying fewer products,including those imported from other countries - and cannot be expectedto pay for a global economic recovery.


Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.