Every two weeks, we prepare a report focused on understanding market intelligence and analyzing construction industry data and trends.
This in-depth report is developed primarily for internal distribution, but because we want to keep construction professionals like you informed about the industry, we make this report available to anyone who's interested in reading it.
What's New In This Report?
Highlights
The ABI remained slightly above 50 (neutral) in April 2019 at 50.5 points, with the South region and the Mixed Practice sector in the lead.
The Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) reported an 8.8% increase from February in their Construction Backlog Indicator (CBI) to 9.5 months of backlog in March 2019.
Construction Update
In April 2019, housing permits reflected an annual rate of 1.27M, 5.0% down from their year-ago rate with a decrease in Single-family but an increase in Multi-family permits.
Also, housing starts in April 2019 were 2.5% below their year-ago rate with 1.23M starts, with a decrease in Single-family, but an increase in Multi-family starts.
673K new Single-family homes were sold in April 2019, 7.0% above the year-ago rate.
Economic Update
The second estimate of real GDP growth for Q1 2019 was 3.1%, an increase from the previous quarter's estimate of 2.2%.
The ABC Construction Confidence Index reports that the majority of Non-Residential contractors are confident about sales growth, profit and staffing levels in 2019.
