New home starts in the US fell sharply in July as the industry takes a double whammy from widespread tightening and rising mortgage rates.
In particular, housing starts plunged 9.6% month-on-month in July to an annual rate of 1,446 units, which was the lowest in 17 months since February 2021.
At the same time, they moved lower than the market’s estimate for a big drop, but more mildly at 1.54 million units.
Compared to the same period last year, the drop was 8.1%.
Meanwhile, building permits for new homes fell by 1.3% to 1.67 million in July, against an estimate for a decline to 1.63 million.
In the individual figures, single-family home starts fell 10.1% to 916k and building starts with five or more units slipped 10% to 514k.
A drop was observed in the Midwestern states (-33.8% to 139 thousand), in the South (-18.7% to 710 thousand) and in the West (-2.7% to 367 thousand), while on the contrary a strong increase was shown in the Northeast ( 65.5% at 230 thousand).
Source: Capital
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