New Residential Housing Starts In March Worse Than Forecast
Doug Short | Apr 20, 2016 12:42AM ET
The U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development have now published their findings for March new residential housing starts.
The latest reading of 1.089M was below the Investing.com forecast of 1.170M.
Here is the opening of this morning's monthly report:
Privately-owned housing starts in March were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,089,000. This is 8.8 percent (±11.1%)* below the revised February estimate of 1,194,000, but is 14.2 percent (±11.7%) above the March 2015 rate of 954,000.
Single-family housing starts in March were at a rate of 764,000; this is 9.2 percent (±10.3%)* below the revised February figure of 841,000. The March rate for units in buildings with five units or more was 312,000. [link to report ]
Here is the historical series for total privately-owned housing starts, which dates from 1959. Because of the extreme volatility of the monthly data points, a 6-month moving average has been included.
The Population-Adjusted Reality
Here is the data with a simple population adjustment. The Census Bureau's mid-month population estimates show substantial growth in the US population since 1959. Here is a chart of housing starts as a percent of the population. We've added a linear regression through the monthly data to highlight the trend.
A Footnote on Volatility
The extreme volatility of this monthly indicator is the rationale for paying more attention to its 6-month moving average than to its noisy monthly change. Over the complete data series, the absolute MoM average percent change is 6.3%. The MoM range minimum is -26.4% and the maximum is 29.3%.
For visual confirmation of the volatility, here is a snapshot of the monthly percent change since 1990.
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