May 16 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. consumer confidence was the weakest this month since :S:d1">Jimmy Carter was president, and single- family home construction fell to a 17-year low in April.

The Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary index of consumer sentiment dropped to 59.5, compared with an average reading of 85.6 in 2007.

The figures show that consumers see more pain ahead, even as Wall Street executives proclaim that the worst of the credit crisis is over. The rout in housing is depressing home values, a threat to the consumer spending that accounts for more than two- thirds of gross domestic product.

The confidence index was forecast to fall to 62, according to the median of 65 forecasts. The index of consumer expectations for six months from now, which more closely projects the direction of consumer spending, dropped to 51.7 from 53.3.

Fed's Yellen

Home construction and property values “seem likely to decline well into 2009,'' Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco President Janet Yellen said May 13.