Today’s New Residential Construction Report continues to firmly demonstrate the intensity of the total washout conditions that now exist in the nation’s housing markets and for new residential construction showing tremendous declines on a year-over-year basis to single family permits both nationally and across every region.Single family housing permits, the most leading of indicators, again suggests extensive weakness in future construction activity dropping 40.3% nationally as compared to January 2007.
Moreover, every region showed significant double digit declines to permits with the West declining 53.8%, the South declining 37.5%, the Midwest declining 34.3% and the Northeast declining 29.7%.
Keep in mind that these declines are coming on the back of last year’s record declines.
To illustrate the extent to which permits and starts have declined, I have created the following charts (click for larger versions) that show the percentage changes of the current values on a year-over-year basis as well as compared to the peak year of 2004.
Declines to single family permits have NOW ACCELERATED measurably in terms of monthly YOY declines, and the fact that we are now seeing declines of roughly 30%-50% on the back of 2006 declines should provide a an unequivocal indication that the housing markets are by no means stabilizing.
Here are the statistics outlined in today’s report:
Housing Permits
Nationally
- Single family housing permits down 40.3% as compared to January 2007.
- For the Northeast, single family housing down 29.7% as compared to January 2007.
- For the Midwest, single family housing permits down 34.4% as compared to January 2007.
- For the South, single family housing permits down 37.5% compared to January 2007.
- For the West, single family housing permits down 53.8% as compared to January 2007.
Nationally
- Single family housing starts down 33.8% as compared to January 2007.
- For the Northeast, single family housing starts down 16.7% as compared to January 2007.
- For the Midwest, single family housing starts down 31.1% as compared to January 2007.
- For the South, single family housing starts down 32.3% as compared to January 2007.
- For the West, single family housing starts down 49.1% as compared to January 2007.
Nationally
- Single family housing completions down 32.6% as compared to January 2007.
- For the Northeast, single family housing completions down 51.1% as compared to January 2007.
- For the Midwest, single family housing completions down 22.8% as compared to January 2007.
- For the South, single family housing completions down 35.6% as compared to January 2007.
- For the West, single family housing completions down 24.1% as compared to January 2007.
