How could anyone take pot shots at a nearly 15 percent monthly jump in anything, not to mention housing starts, which have been mired in the mud for ages now?

Apparently pretty easily.

I knew the moment I saw the number that there would be those arguing that any gain in new home construction is a negative because of the already bloated inventory of new, existing and foreclosed properties on the market.

Miller Tabak’s Peter Boockvar provided that: “Bottom line, I repeat again that we don’t need an increase in single family housing starts with a 9.3 month inventory to sales ratio of existing homes, but hopefully the pace of permits will prove the June jump as being an outlier (admittedly, the pace is still extremely depressed). Multi-family is where the housing construction benefits are being seen, and that will be the case for years to come.”

While single family starts were up over 9 percent, it was multi-family driving the train in this report, up nearly 32% month-to-month. We all saw that coming, as rental demand has been surging, and there is not near enough supply in the pipeline. Patrick Newport of IHS Global Insight sees today’s report as highly predictive of housing’s slow slog back.

Page 1 of 3 | Next Page
Show Entire Article

Senate Group Unveils Deal On Major Deficit Plan

If US Loses Triple-A Rating, Almost Anything’s Possible

Rupert Murdoch: ‘This Is the Most Humble Day of My Life’

Man Attempts to Hit Murdoch With Foam Pie at Hearing

What’s An Online MBA Degree Really Worth?

More Top Stories

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/43809723?__source=RSS*blog*&par=RSS