(Bloomberg) -- D.R. Horton Inc. shares fell the most in more than four years after the homebuilder reported disappointing results for its fiscal fourth quarter and signaled that affordability challenges are holding back buyers.

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The company has been using incentives such as mortgage rate buy-downs to lure customers and put purchases within closer reach — an effort that will continue, executives said on a conference call Tuesday. Still, orders for the three months through September fell short of what analysts were expecting, and the builder’s forecast for home deliveries for fiscal 2025 also disappointed.

The shares tumbled as much as 15%, the biggest intraday decline since March 2020. They were down 13% to $157.71 at 10:09 a.m. New York time. Other builders also declined, with an S&P index of the companies falling 7%.

While 30-year mortgage rates slipped throughout the quarter, they have been climbing more recently. Home prices have also continued to rise, further stretching would-be buyers. D.R. Horton’s results suggest buyers may be holding off, expecting lower rates next year. The upcoming presidential election is adding another layer of uncertainty.

“We are seeing our buyers sit on the sidelines, sit on the fence, a little less motivated today than they were previously in prior quarters,” Chief Executive Officer Paul Romanowski said on the call. “There’s just a lot of noise in the market today. The rate volatility we’ve seen, combined with the election news that’s out there, I just think we’re seeing people take a pause. But it certainly is a stretch today.”

Some house hunters may be waiting for financing costs to fall below a certain point, but “stability in rates is most helpful for us” in generating buyer demand, Romanowski said.

In the three months through September, buyers signed contracts for 19,035 homes, up 5% from a year earlier, D.R. Horton reported. Analysts estimated 19,994, the average in a survey compiled by Bloomberg. The company said it expects to close 90,000 to 92,000 home sales in fiscal 2025, which also was lower than the consensus of analysts.

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