New Home Construction Highest in Four Years
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iStockphoto/Thinkstock(WASHINGTON) — Builders broke ground on single-family homes and apartments last month at the fastest rate since July 2008.
The government says housing starts rose 15 percent from August — a yearly rate of 872,000 homes.
Construction permits jumped nearly 12 percent — also the highest since July 2008.
Construction activity is now more than 82 percent higher than the recession low in April 2009.
But David Crowe, chief economist with the National Association of Home Builders, warns that we’re not out of the woods yet. “We’re still less than halfway back to what would be considered a normal market – so we have a long way to go and there are still many hurdles out there that we have to cross,” he said.
Crowe continued, “A full-blown healthy market on a national level is going to take all the way out to 2016 or 2017.”
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