Home construction in the US surged in July. Housing starts climbed almost 16 per cent last month to an annual rate of 1.093 million units, the Commerce Department said Tuesday. That marked the highest level of construction since November, driven by a pronounced rise in new apartments.
Home construction rose 22 per cent in the year through July, and a rise in applications for building permits last month suggests further gains this year.
Tuesday’s report showed that starts on single-family homes, which reflects the bulk of the market, climbed 8.3 per cent in July from June.
Construction of multifamily units—mostly condominiums and apartments—rose 33 per cent to a pace of 423,000 units, the highest level since January 2006.
The report also indicated the building industry will probably consolidate gains in coming months as permits for future projects advanced 8.1 per cent to a 1.05 million pace, about in line with the current level of starts. The gain reflected the most applications for single-family dwellings since November.
Housing Starts, US
From a year ago, home construction in the US was up 21.7 per cent.
Construction of multifamily projects such as condominiums and apartments rose 28.9 percent to an annual rate of 437,000, the most since January 2006 and the second-strongest since February 2000.
Three of four regions showed an increase in groundbreaking last month, led by a 44 percent jump in the Northeast to the highest level since July 2008. Starts rebounded 29 percent in the South and climbed 18.6 percent in the West.
In other news, sales of previously owned homes rose to their highest level in 10 months.
Sales of existing homes increased 2.4 per cent from June to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.15 million, the National Association of Realtors said Thursday. July sales were down 4.3 per cent from a year earlier, when sales peaked for 2013 before a jump in mortgage rates threw the housing recovery off track. July was the fourth consecutive month sales rose from the prior month.