Today’s New Residential Construction Report showed mixed results with total permit activity increasing 3% since January while total starts dropped a whopping 17.0% over the same period.
Single family housing permits, the most leading of indicators, declined 6.2% from January to 620K single family units (SAAR), and rose 2.8% above the level seen a year earlier but still remained well below levels seen at the peak in September 2005.