Every two weeks, Oldcastle Building Solutions Business Intelligence prepares a report focused on understanding and analyzing construction market data and trends.
This in-depth report is developed primarily for internal distribution, but Oldcastle Building Solutions exists to inform construction professionals like you, so we're making this report available for anyone who's interested in reading it.
What's New In This Report?
Highlights
The ABI rose 2.6 points in October 2017 to 51.7. Both the new project inquiries and design contract components made gains and all sectors showed positive momentum.
In November 2017, the HMI rose 2 points to 70. The Northeast region score jumped 14 points to 63, well above its year-long average of 49.
Construction Update
In October 2017, housing permits reflected an annual rate of 1.3M, 0.9% above its year-ago rate. Over the year, Single Family permits are up 7.7%, while Multi-Family permits are down 9.5%.
Housing starts in October 2017 were 2.9% below their year-ago rate, with 877K Single Family starts and 413K Multi-Family starts in the month.
685K new Single Family homes were sold in October 2017, 18.7% above the revised
year-ago rate. The second consecutive month of strong sales resulted in the supply of new homes for sale (at current sales rate) to drop to 4.9 months from 6.1 months in August.
Economic Update
The second estimate of real GDP growth for Q3 2017 was 3.3% (up from 3.0% growth in first estimate), following 3.1% growth in second quarter.
41 of 51 states showed year-over-year construction employment gains in October 2017; with the strongest gains in Nevada, Rhode Island and Oregon.
