Single-Family Housing Starts Hit 9-Year High

If you're reading this, chances are good that you've already heard something about the serious inventory shortages that have been supressing home sales for months. A lack of available homes on the market has made the home-buying process very painful for some shoppers, and has contributed to the unhealthy price gains that have been occurring in some of the nation's most competitive markets. Luckily, new data from the Commerce Department indicates that inventory relief might finally be on the horizon in the form of new construction!

The report, which was just released on Thursday, showed that new housing starts rose in October to a seasonally-adjusted rate of 1.323 million homes, the highest rate since August of 2007! In fact, that rate represented an over 25% increase compared to September and an over 23% increase compared to October of 2015.

The 1.323 million figure includes both single and multifamily home starts; however, the 869,000 which were single family homes was also a 9-year high.

In contrast to starts, housing permits, which indicate future construction, rose only slightly, from 1.225 million in September to 1.229 million in October. Although this was only a 0.3% increase from month to month, it was still nearly 5% higher than October 2015.

This increase in new construction is especially welcome considering it was predicted to be one of the two major drivers in housing market growth in 2017 (the other being millennials).

Source: Get Ready to Sell More New Homes