Housing construction is showing a 30 percent gain in the first quarter in the Kansas City region, compared with the same period of 2012.The reference is to permits for residential building and amounts to 832 single family houses. There were 640 in the first three months of last year.
The numbers bear watching, as the executive officer of the Home Builders Association of Greater Kansas City notes. Sara Corless said, should the trend hold or increase, construction might be back at 2007 levels by end of the year.
Corless says construction is so active she has a hard time reaching some builders.
The year 2012 was not a completely smooth home building route. A ‘couple of hiccups’ in last year, as Corless described it, but the numbers are favorable and builders and real estate agents and buyers are getting together, “interest rates continue to be low . We don’t know what to expect in 2014 in terms of interest rate and I think people are feeling as though they’ve waited perhaps as long as they can.”
Not all are single family homes.
Corless said one reason for the building boost is apartment construction, with 129 in Johnson County Kansas beginning in the first quarter.
Corless said nationally, building a hundred new homes accounts for more than 300 full time jobs, $23 million in wage and business income and nearly $9 million in tax revenue. And the numbers are near to that for the Kansas City region.
Commercial construction fell markedly according to McGraw –Hill Construction analysis, off 68 percent nationwide.