New Home Construction Decreases in Wisconsin

Wednesday, August 17th, 2022 -- 9:01 AM

(WMTV) New home construction in Wisconsin has decreased this year compared to last.

According to the Wisconsin Builders Association, for quarter two of this year, between April 1st and June 30th, 3,328 permits were issued for newly constructed single-family homes. That is a 24% decrease from 4,382 permits issued during the same period in 2021.

“Not terribly surprising when you look at some of the variables that we’ve seen including inflation, interest rates going up, a war in Europe, none of those are things that are good for the market,” Wisconsin Builders Association Executive Director Brad Boycks said. However, a new trend in the data shows an unusually high number of new builds in rural parts of the state.

“That has to be driven by the fact that some people may not have gone back to the office and, when they’re given the choice, you know, some people are choosing to be in more rural parts of the state. Probably cheaper land, you know, maybe want to get out of the city and get into the country,” Boycks said. While there has been a decrease in new come construction this year, the numbers show a 52% increase from where they were pre-pandemic.

“I think there was a lot of pent-up demand. I mean, I think nobody, when we were all kind of hunkered down in 2020, could see that we were going to have the takeoff that we did 2020. And then followed up with an extremely strong year in 2021. So, I think, you know, a lot of that was, you know, people having time to think about their housing options, some choosing to remodel, you know, quite a few choosing to build new homes,” Boycks said.

Feel free to contact us with questions and/or comments.