“The April report was not a great one for single-family housing, with single-family starts, permits and completions all declining,” Kushi said. “The slower pace of single-family permits suggests a reduced rate of single-family groundbreaking in the upcoming months, due to higher inventory levels in key markets and ongoing challenges with costs and affordability.
“Consumers are feeling jittery and might need more than just a mortgage rate buydown to jump into the market.”
In April, there were 927,000 single-family housing starts compared with March’s 947,000. Overall, privately-owned housing starts were up 1.6% to 1.361 million, an increase from 1.339 million in March, but down 1.7% year over year. Buildings with five or more units drove the overall increase, with 420,000 reported in April.
While the overall housing starts increased in the month, the 1.361 million starts were lower than the consensus expectations of 1.364 million.
Builder confidence drops to lowest since December 2022
Privately-owned housing units authorized by building permits were reported at 1.41 million, down 4.7% from March’s 1.48 million. It was also a 3.2% drop year over year. Single-family permits showed a greater decline, as the 922,000 reported for April was down 5.1% from March.
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