U.S. Housing Starts Surge in May
by:Tom Moeller
|in:Economy in Brief
Summary
- Both single-family & multi-family starts jump.
- Improvement fails to include the Northeast.
- Smaller gain in building permits dominated by single-family.
Total housing starts strengthened 21.7% (5.7% y/y) during May to 1.631 million (SAAR) following a 2.9% April decline to 1.340 million, revised from 1.401 million. Starts were at the highest level since April 2022. Longer term, starts remained 28.2% below the January 2006 peak of 2.273 million. The Action Economics Forecast Survey expected 1.39 million starts in May.
Starts of single-family homes increased 18.5% last month (-6.6% y/y) to 997,000 after easing 0.2% in April to 841,000, revised from 846,000. Starts of multi-family units jumped 27.1% (33.2% y/y) to 634,000 after falling 7.1% in April to 499,000, revised from 555,000.
Starts in the Midwest jumped by two-thirds m/m (24.2% y/y) in May to 282,000 after increasing 27.1% in April. Starts in the West improved 16.4% (1.2% y/y) to 341,000 after surging 24.7% in April. In the South, starts rose 20.3% (6.7% y/y) to 908,000 after falling 8.7% in April. To the downside, starts in the Northeast fell 18.7% (-21.9% y/y) to 100,000 after falling by one-third m/m in April.
Building permits rose 5.2% in May (-12.7% y/y) to 1.491 million units after falling 1.4% in April to 1.417 million units, revised from 1.416 million. Single-family permits rose 4.8% (-13.2% y/y) to 897,000 after increasing 3.3% in April. Multi-family permits rose 5.9% last month (-12.0% y/y) to 594,000 after a 7.7% April drop.
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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