The US Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development have released residential construction figures for January 2015. Building permits for privately-owned housing units came in at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.053 million, down 0.7% on the revised December 2014 rate but up 8.1% on January 2014. Single-family building permit authorisations were also lower than in December 2014. Authorisations fell from December’s revised rate of 675 000 to 654 000 in January 2015, a drop of 3.1%.
Housing starts followed a similar trend. Privately-owned housing starts for January 2015 are estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.065 million. This compares to 1.087 million in December 2014 (-2%) and 897 000 starts in January 2014 (+18.7%). The January 2015 rate for single-family housing starts was 678 000, 6.7% lower than the revised December 2014 figure of 727 000.
There was more positive news for privately-owned housing completions, with the seasonally adjusted annual rate of 930 000 increasing by 1.3% m/m and 9.4% y/y. However, single-family housing completions declined by 2.3% when compared with the revised figure for December 2014.
Adapted from press release by Louise Fordham