U.S. building permits down 31.3% year-over-year
U.S. housing starts down 25.5% year-over-year
U.S. Nov. building permits fall to 9-year low.
U.S. Nov. building permits short of 1.55 mln expected
U.S. Nov. housing starts exceed 1.54 mln expected.
U.S. Nov. building permits fall 3% to 1.506 mln pace.
U.S. Nov. housing starts up 6.7% to 1.588 mln pace
Building permits are down 31.3% in the past year and are down 14.1% in the first 11 months of 2006 compared with the same period in 2005.
Regionally, starts rose 8.6% in the Northeast and rose 18.5% in the South. Starts fell 6.3% in the Midwest to the lowest level in 15 years. Starts fell 8.1% in the West to the lowest level in five years.
http://calculatedrisk.blogspot.com/2006/12/housing-starts-and-completions.html
Click on graph for larger image. The first graph shows Starts vs. Completions. Starts have fallen "off a cliff", but completions have just started to fall.
This graph shows starts, completions and residential construction employment. (starts are shifted 6 months into the future). Completions and residential construction employment are highly correlated, and Completions lag Starts by about 6 months. Based on historical correlations, it is reasonable to expect Completions and residential construction employment to follow Starts "off the cliff". This would indicate the loss of 400K to 600K residential construction employment jobs over the next 6 months.