BMATWT 352 - Building Materials and Forest Products Marketing

US Housing - Q2 Statistics

 

US Census Bureau - "New Residential Construction in July, 2006"

Building Permits

Building Permits	July, 06	June, 06	July, 05
Number	1,747,000	1,869,000	2,206,000
July 06 % Change		-6.5%	-20.8%

 

Housing Starts

Housing Starts	July, 06	June, 06	July, 05
Number	1,795,000	1,841,000	2,070,000
July 06 % Change		-2.5%	-13.3%

National Assoc. of Home Builders -"Builders Confidence Slides in August

Builder Perceptions

Perception	July, 06	June, 06	%Change
Current single-family homes	36	43	-16%
Sales Expectations (6 mos.)	40	46	-13%
Prospective buyer traffic	21	27	-22%

• "good" "fair", or "poor" with any number over 50 meaning more builders view sales conditionas as good than poor.
• Lowest point since 1991
• rising sales cancellations
• substantial growth in inventories of new and existing homes
• "historically, builder sentimetn tends to contract bya greater margin than acutal sales.. activity" - AKA Talk is Cheap

National Assoc. of Realtors

• Despite overall decline, 20 states showed increased sales activity.
• Existing home sales - 6.69 million unit annual rate, down 7% from 7.19 million record Q2 05 level
• States w/high housing costs, or period of rapid gains - now slower sales.
• 30 year conventional mortgage rates
• July, 06 - 6.60%
• Q1, 06 - 6.24%
• Q2, 05 - 5.72%
• Good news for HOME BUYERS

Produced and maintained by David T. Damery
Building Materials and Wood Technology
Department of Natural Resources Conservation
College of Natural Resources and the Environment
University of Massachusetts, Amherst.