SACRAMENTO, CA - Housing production in California in 2009 is expected to decrease from the already record-low numbers seen in 2008, the California Building Industry Association says.
The industry group Tuesday is forecasting just 63,400 units will be produced in 2009, a 3 percent decrease from the record-low 65,380 units produced last year.
In comparison, the low point of the homebuilding recession in the early 1990s was 84,656 units in 1993, while the worst year during the recession of the early 1980s was 85,656 in 1982.
The forecast, prepared by the Construction Industry Research Board, predicts California will produce 30,000 single-family units in 2009, down 9 percent from the 33,048 constructed in 2008, and 33,400 multifamily units, up a modest 3 percent from the 32,332 permits issued in 2008.
To meet the need for new housing generated by population growth, the state estimates builders should produce about 220,000 new homes and apartments annually, the CVIA says.
"These numbers do not bode well for our industry, or the economy, and we could be in for a very rough year," says Robert Rivinius, CBIA's president and CEO. "We will continue to ask state and federal lawmakers to enact a tax credit for new homebuyers, which has proven in the past to be an effective means of revitalizing distressed housing markets."
Mr. Rivinius says a temporary homebuyer tax credit enacted by Congress during the 1970s when the housing market was going through a similar downturn "doubled" home sales.
He also says it is imperative that banks work with homebuilders on existing projects and again start lending funds for new housing projects in order to spur job-generating new-home construction.
Source: Central Valley Business Times