Lakeshore Analytics

Permits and housing starts unchanged in almost 2 years

About 20 new single family homes have been permitted in the city for August and September, less than a third of the pre-recession levels. After briefly flirting with single digits, multifamily permits stayed at about 150 units in September. Multifamily permits are more volatile because they are issued in bursts, whereas single family permits are [...]

Low starts good news for housing market

The Census Bureau released its estimate of seasonally-adjusted housing starts for the month of July, which were an annual rate of 598,000 starts, up 10 percent from the year before. This is the number most media commentators will focus on (“up 10%” and “better than expected”) but the key is that it’s still very low. [...]