U.S. Housing Starts Rebound in February
by:Tom Moeller
|in:Economy in Brief
Summary
- Single-family and multi-family starts rebound.
- Starts are mixed throughout the country.
- Building permits rise modestly.
Alongside the recent decline in mortgage rates, total housing starts increased 10.7% (5.9% y/y) during February to 1.521 million (SAAR) after falling 12.3% to 1.374 million in January, revised from 1.331 million. But it was still 15.6% below the most recent peak of 1.803 million in April 2022. The Action Economics Forecast Survey expected 1.428 million starts in February.
Improvement in activity was broad-based last month. Starts of single-family units increased 11.6% (35.2% y/y) to 1.129 million following a 4.9% January decline to 1.012 million, revised from 1.004 million. Multi-family starts rose 8.3% (-34.8% y/y) in February to 392,000 after falling 27.9% to 362,000 in January, revised from 327,000.
Regional activity, however, was mixed in February. Starts in the Midwest surged 50.7% (8.0% y/y) to 202,000 following a 34.3% January decline. Starts in the South improved 15.7% (11.5% y/y) to 883,000 after falling 10.3% in January. In the West, however, starts dropped 7.9% (-10.8% y/y) to 314,000 after declining 11.0% in January. In the Northeast, the level of starts fell 10.3% (+16.2% y/y) to 122,000 after rising 6.3% in January.
Building permits improved 1.9% (2.4% y/y) in February to 1.518 million after easing 0.3% to 1.89 million in January, revised from 1.470 million. It was the highest level of permits in six months. Single-family permits rose 1.0% (29.5% y/y) to 1.031 million in February following a 2.2% January increase. Multi-family permits rebounded 4.1% (-29.0% y/y) to 487,000, after declining 5.3% in January.
The housing starts and permits figures can be found in Haver's USECON database. The expectations figure is contained in the AS1REPNA database.
Tom Moeller
AuthorMore in Author Profile »Prior to joining Haver Analytics in 2000, Mr. Moeller worked as the Economist at Chancellor Capital Management from 1985 to 1999. There, he developed comprehensive economic forecasts and interpreted economic data for equity and fixed income portfolio managers. Also at Chancellor, Mr. Moeller worked as an equity analyst and was responsible for researching and rating companies in the economically sensitive automobile and housing industries for investment in Chancellor’s equity portfolio. Prior to joining Chancellor, Mr. Moeller was an Economist at Citibank from 1979 to 1984. He also analyzed pricing behavior in the metals industry for the Council on Wage and Price Stability in Washington, D.C. In 1999, Mr. Moeller received the award for most accurate forecast from the Forecasters' Club of New York. From 1990 to 1992 he was President of the New York Association for Business Economists. Mr. Moeller earned an M.B.A. in Finance from Fordham University, where he graduated in 1987. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from George Washington University.
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