The numbers are in and for the fifth consecutive year the housing industry in Northeast Florida has set a record for single-family building permits.
The Jacksonville MSA of Duval, Clay, Nassau and St. Johns counties recorded 13,636 single-family building permits compared to 12,784 in 2003 according to the Department of Commerce.
Here’s the year-by-year numbers:
2002 - 10,847
2001 - 9,610
2000 - 7,857
1999 - 8,052
1998 - 7,644
1997 - 6,955
1996 - 7,459
1995 - 6,458
1994 - 7,176
“Northeast Florida’s builders continue to move forward to meet the strong housing demand that has characterized the local marketplace for some time, and we are confident that 2005 will be another excellent year for housing,” said Bryan Lendry, president of Brylen Homes.
Lendry, who also serves as president of the Northeast Florida Builders Association, cited the area’s diverse economy, low interest rates and the value of home ownership as reasons for another record year for housing.
“With great interest rates and an economy that doesn’t depend on one sector of industry we knew 2004 was going to be special. Add the great investment value of home ownership and you have the ground work for a healthy housing market,” Lendry said.
Following a decline associated with unusually wet weather in November, national housing starts bounced back in December, bringing single-family production to a record annual level in 2004. Furthermore, the backlog of unused permits rose in December, providing forward momentum for housing production starting off the New Year.
National housing starts in December climbed 10.9 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 2.004 million, according to the Commerce Department’s monthly report today on residential construction. A total of 1.953 million housing units were started last year, up 5.7 percent from 1.848 million starts in 2003.
Lendry noted that the industry was helped last year by persistently low mortgage interest rates, and he said that ongoing gains this year in jobs and household income should help offset the slow but steady rise in mortgage interest rates that is anticipated as a result of Federal Reserve policy.
“We are geared up for another big housing year,” Lendry said, “although we don’t expect to be building at quite the break-neck pace of 2004.”
Economists like David Seiders of the National Association of Home Builders said he expected to see a modest decline, of roughly 3 percent to 4 percent, in housing starts this year as the result of higher mortgage rates, which are projected to average about 6.3 percent on fixed-rate loans, up from 5.8 percent last year.
“Home building in December was absolutely solid, finishing up the year nicely after some softening in November that was related to bad weather,” Seiders said. “The level of unused building permits moved up last month, and that is a favorable sign for starts activity as we move forward this year.”
Regionally, December starts were up 18.8 percent in the Midwest, to a pace of 379,000 units; 10.6 percent in the South, to 941,000 units; 7.9 percent in the West, to 516,000 units; and 5.7 percent in the Northeast, to 168,000 units.
For the year, starts were up 9.2 percent in the West, 8.3 percent in the South and 6.6 percent in the Northeast; they declined 4.8 percent in the Midwest, primarily reflecting a falloff in multifamily production.