Builders STOP Building a Wall Street Journal Report: Much of the slowdown was concentrated in the Midwest, while groundbreaking on new homes picked up in the Northeast, suggesting that some of March’s mixed performance was weather-driven. Several economists noted that the timing of Easter, which came in March this year, could have dampened the numbers. Starts on single-family homes, which account for roughly two-thirds of the market, fell 9.2% in March to 764,000 from an upwardly revised February rate that represented a multiyear high. Starts on multifamily buildings with five or more units, which include apartments and condominiums, fell 8.5% to a rate of 312,000 in March from the prior month. Single-family homes have been driving much of the increase in recent months, with one-unit starts holding well above 700,000 for the past nine months. Figures for multifamily housing have been more volatile and trending somewhat lower. New applications for building permits, a bellwether for forthcoming construction, fell 7.7% to 1.086 million, from a revised February rate of 1.177 million. “That is somewhat more worrisome as the permit demand has lagged starts for the last two months,” said Joel Naroff of Naroff Economic Advisors, Inc., adding that the low permits number “could signal continued softness in the market.” But Millan Mulraine, economist at TD Securities USA LLC said the fundamentals that underpin a firming housing market, such as steady job growth and low interest rates, are still in place. “We expect building activity to rebound in the coming months as the housing recovery regains its footing following the recent stutters,” he said, although he characterized March’s as “weak.”
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