Market Insights

As far as home exteriors go, Boomers are dead set on brick.

Housing sales data took a turn in the wrong direction in March.

Sales of new single-family houses in March 2012 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 328,000, according to estimates released jointly today by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. 

The March rate is 7.1% below the revised February rate of 353,000, but it’s 7.5% above the same rate from a year ago.

Construction jobs are one of the bright spots of the jobs report

Thursday's market was a bear market, and TTC, SHLD, FAST, and BXC saw the worst of it.

The Home Improvement Research Institute’s Spring Conference next week will examine, among other things, the decision paths of consumers.

The group’s spring conference – “Insights and Resources for the Home Improvement Industry” – will include a session titled: “What paths do consumers take before coming to a decision?”

The Home Improvement Research Institute’s (HIRI’s) September 2012 forecast for the size and trends in the home improvement market points to growth of 4.9% in 2012 and 4.0% in 2013. 

Based on the macroeconomic factors that are known to drive the industry, home improvement sales should outpace GDP growth and bring the market size to $284.8 billion in 2013. 

The top OSHA-cited violation is fall protection, followed by hazard communications.

Commerce Department data released Tuesday morning show February housing starts were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 698,000.

There’s good news and bad news in Tuesday’s data.

February starts declined 1.1% compared with the upwardly revised January figure. And single-family starts declined 9.9% to a rate of 457,000. The total-starts figure fell below expectations, as analysts expected about 710,000.