Housing Construction Up in October 2007 - Sort of!

The US Department or Commerce reported that unexpectedly new construction of dwellings was up 3 percent last month. The largest increase since last February.

However, and it is a big however, the increase was completely in the apartment construction sector. Construction of single-family homes actually fell 7% from September.

It is expected that as long as resale and new home inventories remain high the housing market will not rebound much. The large number of foreclosures (though I personally believe the news media is vastly going out of its way to scare people) is adding to the inventories already on the market.

Applications for building permits that can give us an idea of what the future holds, were also down 6.6% from last month.

On thing I have noticed locally here in Pasco County is that the number of homes coming on the market each day has decreased tremendously over the past few months. In the spring of this year it was not uncommon for me to see 20 to 40 new listings per day. Now it is more likely to be 5 or 6. It could be that we are reaching a peak of those people who want to sell.

I also believe that we are reaching a point where the prices cannot drop here much more (I speak of those homes that are CORRECTLY priced, not those sellers who still have their heads in the clouds.) We knew the same thing, when in 2005, we saw prices increase by 50% here. We knew that that level of appreciation could not continue long. So I believe that little-by-little as the inventories decrease and sellers get pulled kicking and screaming into the real world, we will begin a comeback. May take us most of 2008, but I have no doubt that it will eventually arrive.

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