The U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development have released New Residential Construction statistics for January 2010.
Plain and Simple: Housing Starts rose to their highest level in the last four months and beat economist forecasts, but remain near record low levels. The uptick in housing starts was entirely a factor of new groundbreaking on multi-family projects, which is something we should expect to continue given HUD's focus on improving conditions in the rental market for those who meet "worst case housing needs" Building permits declined sharply but the move was anticipated by forecasters. Remember last month the Census Bureau warned that "Increases in the numbers of housing units authorized by building permits in the Northeast and West in December 2010 may be related to changes to state building codes for new residential construction effective in January 2011 in California, Pennsylvania, and New York." Thus it is of no surprise that building permits correctly so sharply in January. Housing completions have fallen to a new record low. We see a streak of rising housing completions as a forward looking indication of new construction to come. READ MORE
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Source: http://www.mortgagenewsdaily.com/02162011_new_residential_construction.asp
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