Long Recovery For Home Construction Expected
Those directly involved in the home construction industry do not expect it to recover to last year’s levels until 2011. That’s according to David Seiders, chief economist for the National Association of Home Builders. At the peak of the five year housing boom (Jan. 2006), construction started on 2.29 million homes. In order to reach Seiders’s projection for a full recovery, current monthly construction starts would have to jump a whopping 21%. That doesn’t look promising at this point.
While April brought the biggest gain in new-home sales in 14 years, many are not quick to celebrate as builders had to drastically cut prices in order to move their backlog of inventory. In fact, builders had to cut prices more in April than in any month since 1970.