Forbes recently released its new list of Building Boom Towns, ranking the metro areas in the U.S. with the most new construction. New York topped the list, with other cities in the top ten including Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Miami, Boston, Atlanta and Seattle. Here’s the story from Erin Carlyle of Forbes.
To compile Forbes’ list of Building Boom Towns, the folks at Dodge Data sorted through building data for the nation’s largest Metropolitan Statistical Areas – major cities and their surrounding suburbs – to find the 20 places where the most money was spent on new construction in 2015.
Dallas, the No. 2 Boom Town on the list, is benefiting from a stronger national economy: one in which unemployment is down and wages finally rising, with construction a continued bright spot in the economic news. “Vacancy rates continue to decline, and we’re seeing continued increases in rents, which sets the stage for construction growth,” explains Robert Murray, Chief Economist and Vice President at Dodge Data & Analytics.
Dallas is tracking the national uptick in residential construction: $11.3 billion, or two-thirds of new construction spending in the greater metro, was for residential projects, primarily single-family homes. Notably, seven of the 20 biggest projects started last year in Dallas were mixed-use – meaning combinations of commercial space (whether hotel, retail, or in one case a parking garage) with residences.
In 2015 construction spending for ongoing projects across the nation hit its highest annual level since 2008. Construction began on projects worth a total value of $469.5 billion, a 4% increase over 2014, according to Dodge Data. Spending on residential construction starts was up 14% in 2015, led by multi-family (an 18% annual increase) and with a strong showing for single-family (up 14%). “One of the positive elements about 2015 is that single-family housing picked up some momentum,” Murray notes. In four of the last five years multi-family starts have been strong relative to single-family (in 2014 they increased 32% and 3%, respectively). Last year’s strengthening in the single-family housing market is seen as a positive sign that people who lost their homes after the financial crisis might finally be recovering, and that young adults living with their parents might finally be moving out.
[View the full article, and see all of the top 20 cities that made the list]
