Data through: August 2026 · updated Sep 17 · Updates: Monthly · Next: Oct 20
MThe three bars show the last 3 months for this indicator, oldest left to newest right. Bar height reflects each reading relative to the other two — the tallest is the highest of the three, the shortest the lowest.
↑ 7.6% MoM↑ 5.2% YoY
Historical context: Currently in the 36th percentile of all historical readings.
What this means right now: Single-family starts are in the second fifth of their history — between 790K and 950K, subdued construction. By today's bands, about half of all months since 2016 have read here (63 of 128).
Every month's reading, with the band the heatmap gives it. The chart above shows the same series in full.
Month
Value
Band
Aug 2026
918K
Concerning reading
Jul 2026
853K
Concerning reading
Jun 2026
902K
Concerning reading
May 2026
889K
Concerning reading
Apr 2026
914K
Concerning reading
Mar 2026
1017K
Within normal range
Month-end readings of the same series the chart shows, from sf_starts. Values are the current record, not point-in-time: a month that has since been revised shows its revised value.
What is the Single-Family Starts?
Single-family housing starts count the new privately-owned one-unit homes on which excavation began during the month, reported as a seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) in thousands. Starts are the groundbreaking step of the residential pipeline — after the permit, before the months of construction, completion and sale.
This is the single-family slice of the total housing-starts series already on the heatmap (FRED: HOUST). The two sit side by side: total starts include apartment buildings, whose timing follows project financing and can move by hundreds of thousands of units on a few large projects. The single-family series tracks the household-driven part of the sector with 67 years of history.
USMacro's Housing Cycle uses single-family starts as its reference series. Every other member's timing stage (leading, coincident, lagging) was assigned by measuring the lag at which its movements correlate most with this one. Starts are themselves a leading-stage member alongside single-family permits and new-home sales.
How We Color-Code the Single-Family Starts
Our heatmap colors this indicator against historically significant thresholds:
Below 790K
Bottom quintile — the lowest 20% of all months since 1959
790K – 950K
Second quintile — subdued construction, about half of all months since 2016 by today's bands (63 of 128)
950K – 1,090K
Middle quintile — around the long-run median
1,090K – 1,230K
Fourth quintile — strong single-family construction
Above 1,230K
Top quintile of the 1959–2026 history — boom-era construction
Historical Extremes — What Happened Next?
When this indicator reaches extreme levels, history shows consistent patterns:
Jan 2006Housing bubble peak
1823K
The all-time high (January 2006); single-family starts fell 81% over the next 38 months
Mar 2009Financial-crisis trough
353K
The all-time low (353K, March 2009) — below any reading of the 1960s, 1970s or early-1980s downturns
Dec 2020Pandemic building boom
1273K
The highest reading since 2006, as the 30-year mortgage rate fell to its record low of 2.65% in January 2021. Starts were back below 900K by September 2022.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is this the Housing Cycle's reference series?
Because it is the sector's central physical act — the groundbreaking — with 67 years of monthly history and no licensing restriction. The charter assigns every other member's timing stage by the lag, in months, at which its 12-month change correlates most with single-family starts. As the Housing Cycle page serves them: new-home sales a month ahead, construction spending 3 months after, units under construction 4, completions 4. Residential construction jobs follow at 9, FHFA prices at 9, mortgage delinquency at 12. The table is on the Housing Cycle methodology page.
How are the color thresholds set?
By a five-band quintile rule: the 20th, 40th, 60th and 80th percentiles of the series' own history, rounded to the nearest 10K. Today's color reads against the whole history, 1959 to today: the edges now are 790K, 950K, 1,090K and 1,230K. A past month's color — in the Time Machine and in the monthly table — reads against the history up to that month, as it would have read then, so the edges move a little as data arrives. A color exists once the series has ten years of history (here from 1969). Nothing is tuned to the current reading. The bands describe where a reading sits in the sector's own record; they are not a forecast.
How different are single-family and total starts?
Total starts (FRED: HOUST) add units in buildings with two or more units. Multifamily starts ran at about a third of the total in the 2010s and 2020s (31% in each), and their swings follow apartment financing rather than household demand. In July 2026, for example, total starts fell by 130K, and 81K of that was multifamily.
Does a single-family starts decline predict a recession?
USMacro does not publish predictions. The Housing Cycle page lists, as individual rows, every fall of 15% in single-family permits since 1960 — 7 so far. A recession followed within 24 months after 4 of them, and none after 3. Counts, never probabilities.