Housing Construction Lags Behind Job Creation in DC, Per Report

• August 1st 2019

by Nena Perry-Brown

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The U.S. construction industry has not fully recovered since the housing market crash, and the country is feeling the repercussions in the form of a lack of housing supply amid strong job growth.

ApartmentList released a report on Thursday illustrating the extent to which construction of new housing has lagged employment growth — and the extent to which the DC area has balanced this aspect of supply and demand.

Thirty-eight percent fewer housing developments have been permitted in the country compared to the pre-recession peak; however, 1.1 new jobs have been created per new housing unit since 2006. An average of 3.6 units per 1,000 residents have been built in the DC area, along with 3.8 new jobs created per 1,000 residents.

New construction in the DC area has hewed to the narrative among other large metro areas whereby the majority of the new housing is multi-family. Between 1990 and 2005, 23 percent of housing permits in the DC area were for multifamily developments with an average size of 20 units; since 2006, 42.5 percent of regionwide housing permits were for multifamily developments with an average size of 41 units. 

In DC proper, the increased share of multifamily construction has been more negligible, but supply has not kept pace with job creation as much, with 2.3 jobs created per new housing unit. Between 1990 and 2005, 85 percent of housing permits in the DC area were for multifamily developments with an average size of 44.7 units; since 2006, 92 percent of regionwide housing permits were for multifamily developments with an average size of 54.5 units. 

The ApartmentList study uses Census Bureau data on building permits and Bureau of Labor Statistics quarterly data for the job growth numbers.

This article originally published at https://dc.urbanturf.com/articles/blog/housing-construction-lags-behind-job-creation-in-dc-proper-per-report/15724.