NEW YORK: The distressed housing market in the United States should get a lift this spring as bargain prices lure prospective buyers out of hibernation, but tighter lending means that no one should expect the boom days to return soon.

Spring is a pivotal season in the housing market. Potential buyers typically emerge from a winter hiatus and shop in earnest for a new home or an investment. The strength of the market in March, April and May usually sets the tone for the entire year.

This year, spring has assumed even greater importance as it coincides with a sharp U.S. economic slowdown, triggered largely by a falling real estate market. After sales of existing homes sank almost 13 percent last year, a housing revival could put the economy back on solid ground.

When the housing sector thrives, so does the economy as buyers spend heavily on new appliances and furniture while owners pump cash into remodeling or additions.

Even in Arizona and Florida, which are among the states most hard hit by the collapse of the housing market, a few rays of light are starting to shine through.

“If I would have described this whole process as a hurricane coming through Phoenix,” said Floyd Scott, president of Century 21 Arizona Foothills, “I would tell everybody that for the last month Ive been taking the shutters off the windows because I think the eye of the storm, and most of it, is behind us. Now were in the process of picking up the debris.”

In many areas, the choice of homes on the market has increased considerably, with unsold inventory double the typical supply as foreclosures mount and sellers hold out for higher bids.

Indeed, possible buyers are already coming out the woodwork seeking deep discounts.

Signed contracts that have yet to close were more numerous in January than in any month in the prior six, though down 30 percent from January 2007, Scott said. “Weve seen quite a bit of increase in traffic. A lot of people are shopping for deals right now,” he said.

But the roadblock to closing the contracts is ominous.

Many lenders are shutting down the money pipeline to all but the most credit-worthy borrowers, looking to avoid repeating mistakes that led to the current wave of bad mortgages.

“One of the difficulties that we are having obviously in the home market is that lending conditions have really tightened up dramatically,” Scott said.

While a flurry of sales this spring may highlight the pent-up demand in the market, it probably would not signal a sustainable housing upturn this year, most economists agree.

“We have this continuing battle with tightening lending standards and its going to be tough for prospective buyers, even though they want the homes - thats going to be an obstacle,” said Young Kim, an economist at Stone McCarthy Research Associates in Princeton, New Jersey.

Still, demand is stirring as sellers grow desperate to sell properties. Fixed mortgage rates are low, and some home prices are looking too attractive to pass up.

Bidders are emerging for foreclosed homes and for so-called short sales at sharply reduced prices, real estate agents said. In a short sale, the lender agrees to take a loss and avoid foreclosure costs if the borrower is unable to command a sale price that will pay the remaining mortgage balance.

Gary Kent, a real estate agent with Gary Kent Team-RE/MAX Associates in San Diego, California, said he had his best sales month ever in January - selling foreclosure homes for banks.

Meanwhile, the average 30-year mortgage rate is around 6 percent. That is up half a percentage point from four-year lows set last month, but it is roughly a quarter point less than a year ago, based on data from Freddie Mac, the large U.S. home mortgage lender.

The median price for an existing single-family home dropped in 2007 for the first year since the National Association of Realtors began tracking them in 1968, sliding 1.8 percent to $217,800.

By contrast, prices on average have risen 6.6 percent annually over the past 40 years, the association said. Annual double-digit gains were the norm in some areas earlier this decade.

A new government stimulus package will likely also open the doors for more buyers in high-cost areas. It temporarily raises the size of mortgages that can be purchased by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the No. 1 federally chartered home funding company, making some lenders more inclined to approve home loans.

Delays and disruption, disgruntled passengers left standing on platforms, accusations of political incompetence and financial mismanagement: the development of the Spanish railway system has a number of things in common with its British counterpart. But when the new high-speed link between Madrid and Barcelona sets off later this month, those complaints will be set aside as the super-slick Ave S103 service carves its way through the Spanish countryside at speeds of nearly 220mph.

The Ave S103 is the kind of train that British commuters can only dream of, and forms the centrepiece of plans to make Spain a model for the rest of Europe, and the world leader in high-speed trains by 2010.

Its 200-metre aluminium chassis carries 404 passengers, whose reclining chairs - which can swivel to face the direction of travel - are fitted with video and music players.

“They are the future of travel in Spain and show that the train is anything but obsolete,” said Aberlado Carrillo, the director general of the state rail operator Renfe’s high-speed service. “Trains will again be the dominant mode of transport in this country.”

In its first term in office, the socialist government of Josй Luis Rodrнguez Zapatero has spent €21bn (15.7bn) as part of a 15-year €108bn project to transform the rail network. Around 70% of this will be spent on the Ave (short for Alta Velocidad Espaсola, or Spanish high speed).

The aim is to have 10,000km (6,200 miles) of high-speed track in Spain by 2020, meaning that 90% of the population will be no more than 30 miles from a station through which the train passes.

The Barcelona line is to be extended to Perpignan in France, making the Catalan capital just four-and-a-half hours from Paris. Work to join Madrid and Lisbon is under way.

December saw the opening of lines connecting Madrid to Valladolid and to Mбlaga, which have slashed journey times and proved hugely popular. Carrillo describes the success of these two lines as “unprecedented and well ahead of what we expected. Traffic has doubled on the Mбlaga line, and grown by 75% on the Valladolid line.”

The distinction between the Spanish and British models of investment, says Christian Wolmar, the author of a history of Britain’s railways, comes from conflicting philosophies of rail’s worth.

“We ignore the social values of trains,” he says. “Just as we don’t expect motorways to pay their own way, we shouldn’t expect trains to.

“All the recent legislation in the UK, with privatisation, franchising and the complex structures of investment, has meant that it is impossible to have a rational transport policy to maximise the use of trains for environmental and economic reasons.”

But, says Carrillo: “The Ave has to be profitable. From 2010, it will not receive any public subsidies. Our experience of the Madrid-Seville line is that it will be profitable.”

The success of the Madrid-Seville corridor - the first high-speed link, which opened in 1992 - is partly a result of its pricing policy, with affordable tickets that help to keep demand high and trains full. The 290-mile journey takes two-and-a-half hours, and costs between €28.90 (21.60) and €72.20 (53.95) - prices that might make British travellers green with envy.

It will be the Madrid-Barcelona connection, though, that will test the high-speed service. Business people in Spain’s two largest cities, with a combined population of 10 million, have been crying out for the Ave for decades. But its development has not been without problems. The inauguration was delayed by landslides that brought chaos to Barcelona’s commuter service, as contractors rushed to finish the line at the end of last year.

When it finally gets running, the S103 will cover the 410 miles to Barcelona in two hours and 35 minutes, taking two hours off the journey time. But it will face stiff competition from the highly successful air-shuttle, with a route that is one of the busiest in the world.

The “air bridge” operated by Iberia airlines allows passengers to turn up at the airport, buy a ticket, and board, within 20 minutes. Iberia alone has 60 flights a day, carrying 8,000 people.

Antonio Mayo, who is in charge of the service, is not worried by the train. “We have faced competition from other airlines before, and we welcome the fight with the Ave,” he says.

“We can offer one thing they cannot - time. In normal circumstances, a businessman can get from his house in Madrid to a meeting in Barcelona in under two-and-a-half hours. The train cannot do this.”

Mayo accepts that Iberia will take a hit in the first few months, but he believes that an executive who needs to be in a meeting at 9am will always choose to fly.

Carrillo argues that the comparison between train and plane is a false one. “Time spent in a train is time won, while in a plane it is wasted,” he says. “In a train you can work, read, talk, use the internet, eat, or simply relax and enjoy the journey. With a plane, the only objective is to arrive.

“Personally, I am not bothered if the plane arrives 20 minutes earlier than the train. The question is how that time has been used.”

The fact that more than 80% of travellers choose the Ave over the plane on the route between Madrid and Seville supports his argument.

There is also the environmental question: trains produce at least four times less carbon dioxide per mile than planes, and even less when compared with short-haul flights. Spain is preparing itself for a future in which there may be limits on the number of flights a person is allowed to take, particularly within the EU.

In the end, says Carrillo, it will come down to the quality of the service: “What we are offering is unavailable in the rest of Europe in terms of comfort, speed and punctuality.”

Look away now if you are a British commuter used to mind-numbing delays: if an Ave train arrives more than five minutes late, passengers are reimbursed the full price of their ticket. And the only problem for those hoping to get their money back is that the trains are nearly 98% reliable.

OSLO: The European Commission will use Norway as a benchmark for a voluntary European Union code to guide state-owned sovereign wealth funds, the Commissions president said on Monday.

“The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund is exemplary in terms of transparency, governance and accountability,” Josй Manuel Barroso said at a news conference in Oslo. “Its often seen as the gold standard of sovereign wealth funds.”

Norways fund, which is run by the central bank and has 2.08 trillion kroner, or $391 billion, under investment, is designed to preserve the nations oil and gas wealth for future generations. It is run on guidelines set by the government and issues quarterly reports.

Barroso said the European Commission would make proposals on Wednesday for a voluntary code of conduct that could be global as well as across the EU.

He said the Commission would not propose legislation on dealing with such funds, but reserved the right to do so if voluntary means failed to achieve transparency. Some sovereign funds have faced accusations of investing for political purposes instead of profit.

“We cannot allow non-European funds to be run in an opaque manner or be used as an implement of geopolitical strategies,” he said, adding that there were “real concerns” about management of some funds.

“This EU approach must also serve as a contribution to the IMF efforts to set up a global code of conduct for sovereign wealth funds and their owners. We would like agreement on that by the end of the year,” Barroso said.

“Sovereign wealth funds offer opportunities. They are not a big bad wolf at the door. For example, the current financial turmoil shows that sovereign wealth funds can help stabilise financial markets,” Barroso said.

The Commission wants a common approach to avoid unilateral action by member states that could distort the blocs internal market. Its proposal will be sent to EU leaders who are scheduled to meet on March 13-14.

The Norwegian prime minister, Jens Stoltenberg, said he welcomed Barrosos remarks.

“Its a recognition that Norway has set up a management of the fund that ensures openness, ethical guidelines and predictability,” he said.

The Norwegian fund was set up in 1996 to help stash away rising oil and gas revenues in foreign stocks and bonds. Among other guidelines, the fund refuses to invest in companies that make atomic weapons or cluster bombs.