Building permits and housing starts surprised economists as both categories unexpectedly jumped to end the year, according to the Census Bureau’s new residential construction report…(Census Bureau)
- M-O-M: Privately-owned housing units authorized by building permits jumped 9.1% in December to annual rate of 1.873M. Economists had projected a 0.5% decline for the month.
- Y-O-Y: Building permits were up 6.5% from the same time last year.
NOTE: Multi-family building permits were up 28.2% month-over-month and were up a whopping 42.0% year-over-year compared Single-family was up 2.0% for the month and was actually down 8.5% year-over-year.
Housing starts also had an impressive December after economists had projected a 1.9% drop…
- M-O-M: Privately-owned housing starts were up 1.4% to an annual rate of 1.678M.
- Y-O-Y: Housing starts were up 2.5% when compared to the same time last year.
NOTE: Multi-family dominated starts as well with a monthly jump of 13.7% and a year-over-year increase of 56.0% with single-family actually down 2.3% for the month and down 10.9% year-over-year.
Ian Sepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said a strong December points to the underlying strength of the economy…
- “Why are housing starts soaring? Because homebuilders want to cash-in on demand from people who can’t find an existing home to buy. Supply of existing homes is just two months of current sales, while new home are at 6.5, more than three times higher, the biggest spread ever by far”