Reports released by the Commerce Department on Wednesday show that the starts of new homes in the American South, which includes Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C., fell 7.4 percent in August from the previous month.
Nationally, new home construction dropped 6.2 percent from July to August and 33.1 percent from August 2007, baltimore.bizjournals.com reports. The only region showing improvements in new home construction from July to August was the West, where starts rose to 10.8 percent. Numbers declined most sharply in the Northeast, with new home construction down 14.5 percent in the same time period.
Permits also faced the same statistical trends. Permits for future new home construction in the South fell 9.9 percent from July to August and 31.4 percent from the previous year. Nationwide, permits plummeted 8. 9 percent from July to August.