December U.S. housing starts fall; permits surge

ONE ON ONE WITH NEIL GARFIELD

COMBO ANALYSIS TITLE AND SECURITIZATION

EDITOR’S NOTE: There are two things wrong with the facts presented here. First, housing starts fell. Why were there any housing starts? We have a glut of empty homes that were never purchased, a glut of empty homes and neighborhoods that were foreclosed out of existence, and a glut of empty homes caused by unemployment and falling real wages. People are in debt up to their ears, savings are running out, and even parental help is being strained. Where are the buyers coming from?

Second, permits are rising, meaning that new housing starts are expected to rise shortly. It seems to me that between the millions of empty homes and whatever demand is out there, local government could use some creativity and steer buyers into the empty homes before they started construction on new ones. I know that new construction creates jobs, but there are tens of thousands of new jobs that are waiting to be filled but can’t because American workers have not been retrained and foreign workers with training are scarce either because of plain old supply or because of governmental restrictions.

My last comment is longer range: assuming the mortgages are not valid and the chain of title has been corrupted on some 20 million homes, the possibilities are endless for a return of wealth to the middle class and formerly middle class to get back their old homes or move into other empty homes. The construction of new homes in these circumstances is absurd. But the application of existing law, cleaning house on title chains and knocking out intermediaries who never were the lenders, shows far more promise for the fundamentals in our economy.

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By Jeffry Bartash
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) – Construction of new U.S. homes fell 4.3% to an annualized rate of 529,000 in December, but permits jumped 16.7%, the Commerce Department reported Wednesday. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch had expected housing starts in December to drop to 545,000 on a seasonally adjusted basis. Yet permits for new construction, viewed as a more accurate gauge of home building, jumped to an annualized rate of 635,000 in December – the highest level since last March – from a revised 544,000 in November. Housing starts in November were little changed.

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