Alberta Housing Starts (Could) Reflect Economic Improvement
- March 3, 2017
- By Cody Battershill
Alberta New Housing Starts May Be Sign of Something Good...
New housing starts are a good indicator of consumer confidence and can be used to assess where Alberta sits in its ever-changing economic cycle.
Fortunately, home builders managed to find more new projects in February of 2017 in comparison to the previous month, suggesting that Alberta may be beginning to emerge from two years of economic downturn. Search New Construction Homes for Sale in Calgary now.
In February, approximately 27,000 homes began construction, a substantial 40 percent increase over January and 17 percent increase on a year-over-year basis. These figures are reported at annualized rates and seasonally adjusted – that is, as the total number of new homes that would be started over an entire year if the same pace of construction were to be maintained for those 12 months.
However, numbers are still down compared to long term averages. From March 2016 to February 2017, a total of 24,454 new homes were built (calculated from the average for these 12 months), a 28.2 percent decrease from 34,156 properties built during the same period a year earlier. Also see Calgary and Edmonton are Canada's Fastest Growing Cities.
Going Forward
While the increase in last months new housing starts is a step in the right direction, its important to not to be too hasty when coming to conclusions for the future. Out-migration from the province has resulted in higher numbers of properties being left open – or with no contractual agreement to sell or rent.
Economic forecasts predict only a modest upturn in the provinces economy throughout 2017 while employment opportunities will slowly follow. With these factors in mind, its likely that the demand for new homes won’t be pushed back up to higher levels anytime during the remainder of the year.
*Sourced from ATB Financial
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