Following the expiration of the Housing Tax Credit, single-family housing starts continue to fall, and are now 17.2 percent below the revised April number of 565,000. Seasonally adjusted starts for May were 468,000, the lowest level in the past year.
A decline in BUILDER CONFIDENCE seems to have been confirmed as single-family building permits fell by 9.9 percent below the revised April level of 486,000. The low number of building permits is a further indication that housing starts should remain low in the near term as builders and their lenders continue to exercise caution.
See the full report from the Census Bureau.
The graph from Calculated Risk shows just how far housing starts have fallen since their peak.
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