NAHB: May housing report signals stabilizing builder confidence
Although starts decline for month, single-family permits see first increase since November 2018.
Total housing starts declined 0.9% in May to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.27 million units from an upwardly revised reading in April, according to a report from the U.S. Housing and Urban Development and Commerce Department.
The May reading of 1.27 million is the number of housing units builders would begin if they kept this pace for the next 12 months. Within this overall number, single-family starts fell 6.4% to 820,000 units. The multifamily sector, which includes apartment buildings and condos, increased 10.9% to a 449,000 pace.
“The rise in single-family permits echoes the stabilization we are seeing in our builder confidence survey,” said NAHB Chairman Greg Ugalde. “While the increase in permits is a positive sign for the housing market, there are still affordability concerns throughout the country, especially in high-cost areas.”
“The decline in single-family starts is off a solid upward revision in April,” said Danushka Nanayakkara-Skillington, NAHB associate vice president of forecasting and analysis. “This is another indicator that ongoing builder supply-side concerns are making it more difficult to build homes at affordable price points. We expect single-family housing starts to remain flat through 2019.”
Regionally, combined single-family and multifamily starts in May rose 11.2% in the South. Starts declined 45.5% in the Northeast, 8% in the Midwest and 2.4% in the West.
Overall permits, which are a harbinger of future housing production, edged up 0.3% to a 1.3 million unit annualized rate in May. Single-family permits increased 3.7% to 815,000, the first increase since November 2018. Multifamily permits fell 5% to 479,000.
Looking at regional permit data, permits rose 6.8% in the South and 1.8% in the West. Permits fell 24.6% in the Northeast and 8.4% in the Midwest.
Source: www.nahb.org
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