Housing construction intentions made some solid advances to begin the year.

The seasonally-adjusted value of residential building permits* issued by Alberta municipalities* reached $1.1 billion in February, a 3.9% increase from the previous month and only 0.3% shy of the record peak attained in May 2022.

Values of both single and multi-unit dwelling permits stood about 40% higher than last February.

The momentum is even stronger if you look at the number of permits issued. There were a total of 4,215 residential dwellings created in February, up 5.0% from January and 33% year-over-year (y/y).

The monthly gain in issuances was a result of a 36% surge (mostly in multi-unit dwellings) in Calgary, which offset a pull back in Edmonton.

Residential construction intentions in Alberta are traversing a separate path than the rest of the country. Two months in, residential building permits issued in Alberta stood 34% above the same point in 2023 while they were down 6.6% for the national economy.

Housing starts, another indicator of residential construction activity, have also picked up markedly since mid-2023 and were up by 17% in February**.

Looking ahead, robust population-driven demand in Alberta is likely to put continued upward pressure on construction intentions in the coming months despite a higher borrowing cost environment.

*Statistics Canada’s Building Permits Survey covers all Canadian municipalities that issue permits.

**March housing starts are expected to come out today but the release from CMHC is delayed.

Answer to the previous trivia question: Sabermetrics is the empirical analysis of baseball statistics.

Today’s trivia question: In what year was the first Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel awarded?