Housing starts easily beat expectations reflecting homebuilder confidence in the market, according to the latest data from the Census Bureau & HUD…(Census Bureau)
- M-O-M: Privately‐owned housing starts jumped 11.8% to an annual rate of 1,679,000 and single‐family housing starts were up 11.3% to an annual rate of 1,173,000.
- Y-O-Y: Housing starts were up 8.3% and single-family starts were actually down 1.1% when compared to November 2020.
- NOTE: Economists had projected a smaller increase of 4.3% to 1.568M
Building permits also easily beat expectations in November…
- M-O-M: Privately‐owned housing units authorized by building permits jumped 3.6% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,712,000 and single-family permits were up 2.7% to a rate of 1,103,00.
- Y-O-Y: Building permits were up slightly with a 0.9% increase and single-family permits were down 4.7% when compared to November 2020.
- NOTE: Economists had predicted a much smaller increase of 0.6% to 1.663M
Housing completions were also up 4.1% for the month to an annual rate of 1.28M which is up 4.1% from the same time last year.
This reflects the jump in homebuilder confidence that we saw earlier this week and will probably be needed. As hot as the housing market has been these possible rate hikes on the horizon could create some urgency among buyers in the next few months. However, even if the market doesn’t heat up this inventory will be greyly appreciated.