Saskatoon Building Permit Values Drop 29% In Dec, But 2011 Is A Record Year For Permits

Stats Canada is out with their survey for building permits for Dec 2011 here.

Municipalities issued building permits worth $6.8 billion in December, up 11.1% from November. This is the highest level since June 2007. The advance in December was due primarily to an increase in multi-family dwellings in Ontario and commercial buildings in Alberta.

In the residential sector, the value of permits rose 16.1% to $4.5 billion. It was the second consecutive monthly increase. Ontario accounted for much of the growth recorded at the national level.

For Saskatoon, there were $73 million in building permits taken out in Dec 2011, this is down 29% from Dec 2010 when $105 million was taken out in building permits.  Decembers permit values were down 46% from a month earlier.  But the total value of permits taken out in 2011 totaled $1.1 billion, the highest ever on record.

Building permits give us a glimpse into the future of future construction starts such as housing starts, industrial and commercial starts.

Here is monthly residential and non residential permit value in Saskatoon since Jan 2000.

 

Here is annual residential and non residential permit value in Saskatoon since 1990.

The increase in building permit values since 2009 has mostly been the result of the increase in residential building permit values and units.

As I have noted before, construction has blown away every other industry in job growth over the last decade.  Here is how construction employment has changed over the years.