Tag Archive for ‘COVID-19’

Residential Construction Employment Surpasses the February 2020 Level

Total payroll employment rose by 916,000 and the unemployment rate declined to 6.0% in March. The labor market is improving as many states ease business restrictions and more people are vaccinated. Residential construction employment increased by 37,000 in March, while non-residential construction added 73,100 jobs. Currently, employment in residential construction surpassed the level in February 2020, while only 64% of… Read More ›

4Q20 Home Building Geography Index: Diversity Measures

The topic of diversity, and its relationship to homeownership and home building, carries significant implications for policy making, social justice, and equity. In addition to the usual regional classification, NAHB’s Q4 2020 Home Building Geography Index (HBGI) provides a segmentation of the housing market based on county-level measurements of racial and ethnic heterogeneity. For this purpose, we use ESRI’s1 2018… Read More ›

Regional Submarkets See Multifamily Residential Construction Decline in Q4 2020

As part of the latest iteration of NAHB’s Home Building Geography Index (HBGI), it was previously shown that single-family homebuilding in the fourth quarter of 2020 continued a trend of a suburban shift to lower density markets. However, for multifamily residential construction, what started as double-digit growth in all the HBGI’s Regional submarkets in the first quarter of 2020 devolved… Read More ›

Revolving Credit Decreased in January

In January 2020, consumer credit decreased at a seasonally adjusted annual rate by 0.4% from the previous month, with revolving debt1 decreasing by 12.2% and nonrevolving debt2 increasing by 3.2%. Consumer credit totaled $4.2 trillion on a seasonally adjusted annual basis, with $965 billion comprised of revolving debt and $3.2 trillion in nonrevolving debt. This marks a total decrease of $1.3 billion from… Read More ›

Residential Construction Employment Remains Unchanged in February

Total payroll employment rose by 379,000 and the unemployment rate declined to 6.2% in February. The labor market is showing signs of recovery as some states start to ease business restrictions gradually. Employment in construction declined in February due to the severe winter weather in many states. Non-residential construction lost 60,800 positions in February, reflecting declines in nonresidential specialty trade… Read More ›

MBA Data Indicates Slow Decline for Past Due Loan Share

According to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) 2020 fourth quarter National Delinquency Survey (NDS), on a seasonally adjusted basis, the percentage of loans past due decreased from 7.65% in the third quarter to 6.73%. State-level data of the past due loan category reveal that California and Texas made up the top two states with the greatest number of past due… Read More ›

NAHB 4th Quarter HBGI: Suburban Shift for Construction in 2020

The suburban shift in home building to meet growing buyer preferences for lower density, lower cost markets stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic that was first reported in the second quarter National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) Home Building Geography Index (HBGI) has continued throughout the rest of 2020. Single-family construction continued to overperform in suburbs, exurbs and rural communities, according… Read More ›

Another 861,000 Jobless Claims Filed

Weekly initial jobless claims increased for the past two consecutive weeks and reached the highest level in one month in the week ending February 13, despite the decreases in the number of COVID-19 cases. The labor market is recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic, but the road is proving to be long. The U.S. Department of Labor released the Unemployment Insurance… Read More ›

Jobless Claims Fall Slightly

Weekly initial jobless claims declined slightly in the week ending February 6. Continuing claims, which lag initial jobless claims by one week, decreased by 145,000 in the week ending January 30. The labor market is continuing to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, but at a slow pace. The U.S. Department of Labor released the Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report today…. Read More ›