Housing starts, multi family permits near 6 yr low

October housing starts totaling 1.311mm were light relative to expectations of 1.334mm and compares with 1.353mm in September. With this data point it’s always important to separate out the two components of single family and multi family.

Single family starts dropped by 72k m/o/m to 970k which is around where the 6 month average is of 976k vs the 1.023mm 12 month average. This is below the 2021 levels when starts were consistently above 1mm, averaging 1.13mm just as we need more supply right now. Permits for single family construction was little changed at 968k vs 963k last month and vs 967k in the month before.