U.S. housing starts and building permits plunge in April

The Commerce Department reported on Tuesday the housing starts plunged by 30.2 percent m-o-m (the most on record) in April to a seasonally adjusted annual pace of 0.891 million (the lowest level since February 2015), while building permits tumbled by 20.8 percent m-o-m to an annual rate of 1.074 million (the lowest level since March 2015).

Economists had forecast housing starts decreasing to a pace of 0.927 million units last month and building permits declining to a pace of 1.000 million units.

Data for March was revised to show homebuilding growing to a pace of 1.276 million units, instead of increasing at a rate of 1.216 million units as previously reported.

According to the report, permits for single-family homes, the largest segment of the market, decreased 24.3 percent m-o-m to a rate of 669,000 million units in April (the lowest since March 2015), while approvals for the multi-family homes segment slumped 12.4 percent m-o-m to a 373,000 unit-rate (the lowest since Feb 2017).

In the meantime, groundbreaking on single-family homes slumped 25.4 percent m-o-m to a rate of 650,000 units in April (the lowest since March 2015), while housing starts for the multi-family plumped 40.3 percent m-o-m to a 234,000-unit pace (the lowest since April 2013).