The U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development jointly issued new residential construction statistics for August 2023 and the numbers point to a drop in both building permits and housing starts compared to this time last year. The numbers were down 2.7% and 14.8% respectively. Building permits, the report noted, […]

The National Association of Homebuilders (NAHB) has reported that, after steadily rising for seven consecutive months, builder confidence fell for the first time this year in August. The association points to rising mortgage rates that, according to Freddie Mac, are nearing 7%, along with “stubbornly high” shelter inflation, as having eroded housing affordability and put […]

A report from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the U.S. Census Bureau indicates that single-family starts rose to an 11-month high in May. In reporting on the change, the National Association of Homebuilders (NAHB) attributes an increase to limited existing inventory combined with solid demand and improving supply chains. According […]

Members of the U.S. Senate, led by Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas), appealed to the Department of Commerce (Commerce) last week, urging Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo to revise exclusion rules for tariffs on aluminum extrusion products. In a letter addressed to Raimondo, a bipartisan group of seven U.S. Senators suggested that General Approved Exclusion Rules […]

The outlook among homebuilders improved in May, as production for single-family projects saw its highest rate yet in 2023. Confidence in the market for newly built single-family homes rose by five points to 50, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI). The improvement marks a fifth straight month […]

As with many things these days, it’s hard to believe that once upon a time people agreed on things. In 1969, Sen. Gaylord Nelson, a junior senator from Wisconsin who was concerned about the state of the environment in the U.S., saw a massive oil spill in Santa Barbara, Calif. He recruited others to organize […]

Data released by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. Census Bureau just before Christmas shows that sales of newly built, single-family homes in November increased 5.8% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 640,000. At the same time, on a year-to-date basis, new home sales are down 15.2%. The National […]

The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) points to continued elevated interest rates, high building material costs and declining affordability conditions pushing buyers to the sidelines as the source of the continued drag on builder sentiment. NAHB recorded the lowest confidence reading since June 2012 with the exception of the onset of the pandemic in […]

The New York Building Congress and New York Building Foundation have issued their joint, annual publication, the New York City Construction Outlook, for 2022-2024. Spending in the residential building sector in particular is forecast to increase nearly 70% in the next few years over the pre-pandemic period of 2017-2019. The Construction Outlook shows the Big […]

The U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recently reported that the sales of new single‐family homes was up in August 2022, assessed at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 685,000, which the report says is a 28.8% increase over July’s revised rate of 532,000. Despite gains over July, […]