Record low levels of demand continue to haunt the U.S. housing market with July pending home sales re-confirming previous crash-level readings.

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Despite woes in residential real estate, the commercial real estate sector appears to be showing signs of stabilization shinning a light on the iShares Dow Jones US Real Estate (IYR), the Vanguard REIT ETF (VNQ) and the iShares Cohen & Steers Realty Majors (ICF) .

In the month of July, vacancies in apartment buildings, office complexes, retails malls and self-storage facilities showed no significant signs of rising indicating that the sector could be starting to stabilize. In fact, occupancy rates for apartment buildings are currently around 92 percent and around 84 for office buildings, much higher than a year ago. Additionally, rents on commercial properties are no longer falling and numerous real estate investment trusts, known as REITs, are reducing debt on their balance sheets.

August 31, 2010 pre-market open

Here is the pre-market situation on the last business day of the month. All three S&P 500 monthly moving averages are signaling cash.