Employers added 227,000 jobs in January. When this total is combined with the fact that government employees declined by 10,000, private employers actually added 237,000 jobs.
This number is nearly 10% above the last two years’ average of 207,000 new jobs, illustrated in the graph below by the red line.
The same report showed that remodeling businesses added 9,800 workers to their rolls in December; bringing current employment at these businesses to a total of 330,000 jobs. December’s employment at remodeling firms was also 24,000 higher than the prior year total of 306,000 workers.
Employment by remodeling firms has now exceeded the previous peak in employment of 321,000 workers, reached back in October, 2006 — shown by the red line in the chart below.
This data only reflects workers at firms that do mostly remodeling work. It excludes builders for whom residential remodeling projects are not their primary business activity.
We also find that spending by homeowners for remodeling their properties declined by less than 1% in December. But for all practical purposes, homeowners’ remodeling spending has remained flat over the last quarter. It has maintained an annual rate of roughly $153 billion.
The Federal Reserve decided not to increase interest rates at its meeting last week. The bank will continue to target a Federal Funds rate between one-half to three-quarters percent. This means we should not expect much change in mortgage rates over the next month or so. However, a further strengthening of the housing and remodeling markets may put additional pressures on mortgage rates. For now, mortgage rates remained unchanged with the 30-year fixed rate still at 4.19%.
Manuel Gutierrez, Consulting Economist to NKBA
Explanation of NKBA’s Economic Indicators Dashboard
The dashboard displays the latest value of each economic indicator. Note that all the data, except for “mortgage rate” and “appliance store sales” is seasonally adjusted and is represented at annual rates.
Remodeling Expenditures. This is the amount of money spent on home improvement projects during the month in question. It covers all work done for privately-owned homes (excludes rentals, etc.). The data is in billions of dollars and is issued monthly by the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Single Family Starts. It is the number of single family houses for which construction was started in the given month. The data is in thousands of houses and is issued monthly by the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Existing Home Sales. This data is issued monthly by the National Association of Realtors, and captures the number of existing homes that were sold in the previous month.
High-End Home Sales. This series represents sales of new homes priced at $750,000 and over. The data is released quarterly by the U.S. Department of Commerce, and is not seasonally adjusted. Thus a valid comparison is made to the same quarter of prior year.
Mortgage Rate. We have chosen the rate on 30-year conventional loans that is issued by the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (known popularly as Freddie Mac.) Although there are a large number of mortgage instruments available to consumers, this one is still the most commonly used.
Employees in Residential Remodeling. This indicator denotes the number of individuals employed in construction firms that do mostly residential remodeling work.
