The rate of new home starts-including single-family and multifamily units-rose 6.9 percent in June to 760,000 units, the highest pace in nearly four years, according to figures released today by the U.S. Department of Commerce. What's more, the latest figure is 23.6 percent above the June 2011 rate of 615,000 units.
The rate of new home starts-including single-family and multifamily units-rose 6.9 percent in June to 760,000 units, the highest pace in nearly four years, according to figures released today by the U.S. Department of Commerce. What's more, the latest figure is 23.6 percent above the June 2011 rate of 615,000 units.
Looking exclusively at single-family units, starts rose 4.7 percent to 539,000 units in June from a May rate of 515,000. Looking back a year, single-family starts are up 21.7 percent.
"This is one more piece of evidence that housing is starting to take back its traditional role of leading the nation out of recession, and tracks with our forecast for continued improvement in new construction through the end of this year," said NAHB Chief Economist David Crowe. "While many challenges continue to weigh down the housing recovery-including those related to builders' and buyers' access to credit, poor appraisals and the number of distressed properties in certain markets-production of single-family homes is now the strongest it has been since 2010 due to rising consumer demand brought on by improving market conditions."
