Private Residential Construction Spending Rose in January

The Census Bureau said today that construction put in place in January was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $943.1 billion, up 0.1 percent from December and 9.3 percent higher than the rate of $863.1 billion in January 2013.  On an unadjusted basis the January figure was $64.7 billion compared to $59.1 billion the previous year.

Total private construction was at a seasonally adjusted rate of $670.8 billion, an increase of 0.5 percent from the revised December estimate of $667.5 billion and 12.3 percent above the rate of $597.4 billion in January 2013.  The unadjusted value of private construction in January was $47.49 billion compared to $51.1 billion in December and 42.1 billion one year earlier.

Privately owned residential construction was at a rate of $359.9 billion, an increase of 1.1 percent from the $356.0 billion pace in December and up 14.6 percent year-over-year from $314.0 billion.  New single family construction was at a rate of $186.0 billion and multifamily construction at $36.3 billion, increases of 2.3 percent and 1.0 percent respectively from December when the construction totals were $181.9 billion and $36.0 billion. 

On an annual basis single family construction increased 21.0 percent from $153.7 billion and multifamily construction was up 28.0 percent from $28.3 billion.  On an unadjusted basis private single family construction in January was estimated at $12.7 billion and multifamily at $2.8 billion compared to $13.3 billion and $2.8 billion in December.

Total public construction spending in January was at a seasonally adjusted $272.3 billion, 0.8 percent below the revised December estimate of $274.4 billion but 2.5 percent higher than total spending in January 2013 estimated at $265.7 billion.  Public spending for residential construction was down 22.2 percent from a year earlier to $4.5 billion from $5.8 billion and 13.4 percent below December's $5.2 billion in residential expenditures.