Just a quick word about residential construction.

Here are the February numbers:

1. Permits at 547,000 were up 3% from January and down 22.8% from last February 2008.
2. Single family permits were up 11% at 377,000.
3. Starts were 583,000 up 22.2% over January but down 47.3% from February 2008.
4. Single family starts were at 357,000 which is up 1.1% over January.
5. Single family completions in February were 505,000 which is 8.2% below January.

All of the above figures are seasonally adjusted annual rates.

There isn’t anything terribly illuminating about the numbers other than that they may show some bottoming out. Given the size of the U.S. there is an ongoing need for new housing even in the most dire circumstances. If you want to look for something positive, it would have to be the fact that even with moderate economic improvement these sorts of run rates should not be sufficient to provide an adequate supply of housing over the medium term.

As always, the best analysis of housing numbers can be found at Calculated Risk.

more: here