January Construction Spending Flat with December But Down 9.3 Percent YTY

The Department of Commerce said construction spending during January 2010 was estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $884.1 billion, 0.6 percent below the revised December estimate of $889.6 billion. The January figure is 9.3 percent below the January 2009 estimate of $974.3 billion.

Private construction

Spending on private construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $577.3 billion, 0.6 percent below the revised December estimate of $580.7 billion. Residential construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $260.8 billion in January, 1.3 percent above the revised December estimate of $257.5 billion. Nonresidential construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $316.4 billion in January, 2.1 percent below the revised December estimate of $323.2 billion.

With the exception of residential construction and the power market segment, all major construction categories were down month-to-month in the private construction arena. Construction in the power segment was up 15.6 percent year-to-year.

Public construction

In January, the estimated seasonally adjusted annual rate of public construction spending was $306.9 billion, 0.7 percent below the revised December estimate of $308.9 billion. Educational construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $80.3 billion, nearly the same as the revised December estimate of $80.3 billion. The amusement and recreation, power, highway and street and conservation market segments all showed positive gains over Dec. 2009. Several market segments in the nonresidential construction segment registered encouraging gains over Jan. 2009, including residential, office, commercial, transportation, power and highway and street.

Value Of New Construction Put In Place — January 2009

Value of Construction Put-in-Place ($ millions, seasonally adjusted annual rate)Jan. 2010₁Mo. % changeDec. 2009₂Jan. 2009YTY changeTotal Construction 884,125 -0.6 889,624 974,294 -9.3 Total Private Construction ₁ 577,265 -0.6 580,724 673,846 -14.3 Residential (incl. improvements) ₂ 260,847 1.3 257,544 278,786 -6.4 Nonresidential 316,417 -2.1 323,179 395,060 -19.9 Lodging 15,781 -9.8 17,500 29,209 -46.0 Office 32,258 -1.6 32,798 49,014 -34.2 Commercial (incl. farm) 43,995 -0.5 44,225 66,712 -34.1 Health care 33,486 -0.5 33,660 37,439 -10.6 Educational 15,081 -0.7 15,181 17,921 -15.8 Religious 5,720 -0.3 5,738 7,038 -18.7 Amusement and recreation 5,492 -5.1 5,788 8,937 -38.5 Transportation 8,275 -2.7 8,502 8,884 -6.9 Communication 19,048 -6.0 20,259 21,135 -9.9 Power (incl. gas and oil) 80,778 0.7 80,189 69,882 15.6 Manufacturing 55,059 -4.8 57,844 77,252 -28.7 Total Public Construction₁ 306,860 -0.7 308,900 300,448 2.1 Residential 8,305 -3.9 8,640 7,622 9.0 Nonresidential 298,555 -0.6 300,260 292,826 2.0 Office 15,444 -0.8 15,566 14,607 5.7 Commercial 3,587 -9.6 3,968 3,263 9.9 Health care 8,873 -8.2 9,661 8,582 3.4 Educational 80,272 0.0 80,250 85,599 -6.2 Public safety 13,079 -3.4 13,534 14,147 -7.5 Amusement and recreation 10,815 5.5 10,249 10,472 3.3 Transportation 26,805 -0.3 26,883 22,779 17.7 Power 10,002 5.3 9,497 9,585 4.4 Highway and street 83,535 1.2 82,572 79,159 5.5 Sewage and waste disposal 24,562 -3.0 25,317 24,123 1.8 Water supply 14,321 -7.0 15,406 14,901 -3.9 Conservation and development 6,460 -1.2 6,540 4,919 31.3

1-Preliminary; 2-Revised

Note: The U.S. Census department changed its construction categories beginning with its May 2003 statistics. With the changes in the project classifications, data now presented are not directly comparable with those data previously published in the regular-format press releases and tables. Direct comparisons can only be made at the total, total private, total state and local, total federal, and total public levels for annual and not seasonally adjusted monthly data. For more information, check out http://www.census.gov/const/www/c30index.html.