U.S. Housing Starts Rebound Sharply in February After January’s Pullback

Total housing starts increased 11.2% (-2.9% y/y) during February to 1.501 million units (SAAR) after falling 11.5% (revised from -9.8%) in January to 1.350 million, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The Action Economics Forecast Survey expected 1.378 million starts. Single-family starts rose 11.4% (-2.3% y/y) in February after declining 8.6% in January. Multi-family starts rebounded 10.7% (-4.6% y/y) to 393,000, following an 18.8% January drop. Total starts in February remained 17.9% below their peak of 1.828 million units reached in April 2022.

Starts increased in three of the four major regions in February. They rose 47.4% (20.2% y/y) to 143,000 in the Northeast, following a 34.0% January decline. In the South, starts rose 18.3% (-5.6% y/y) to 815,000 after falling 23.0% in January. In the West, starts increased 5.9% (26.2% y/y) to 410,000 after rising 38.2% in January. In the Midwest, starts fell 24.9% (-44.4% y/y) TO 133,000 following a 13.2% January decline.

Building permits fell 1.2% (-6.8% y/y) to 1.456 million in February, the third straight month of modest decline. Single-family permits eased 0.2% (-3.4% y/y) in February to 992,000, the same decline as in January. Multi-family permits weakened 3.1% (-13.4% y/y). Permits fell 15.3% (-45.8% y/y) in the Northeast and were off 7.6% (-8.8% y/y) in the West. Building permits in the Midwest rose 8.9% (3.0% y/y) and in the South they increased 1.0% (1.5% y/y).

The housing starts and building permits figures can be found in Haver’s USECON database. The expectations figure is contained in the AS1REPNA database.