DETROIT — General Motors's Chief Executive Officer Rick Wagoner and Chrysler's new chief Robert Nardelli have both expressed worries that troubles in the housing market are having a negative effect on sales of cars and trucks. Nardelli told Chrysler's board of directors to draft a plan of action to deal with it.

Chrysler was bought in August by Cerberus Capital Management, a private equity firm that hired the former Home Depot chief. Nardelli noted the company is now private and not required to release sales figures. Chrysler will review its product line, he said, but it has no plans to drop the Chrysler, Dodge or Jeep brands. The company will lay off some 13,000 workers, however, and look at other cost saving measures. There is a "direct coupling" between the housing industry and decreased auto buying figures, Nardelli told the Automotive Press Association.

Waggoner said the housing slump has "created an environment where people are a little tense and when they get a little tense they hold onto their dollars and hold their cars a little longer. So we saw reasonably weaker sales the last several months."