New housing permits off by 60% in October

Housing permit activity in Connecticut during October declined by 60 percent from the same period a year ago, according to data released by the state Department of Economic and Community Development.

But it was up against some record competition.

There were 428 new housing units approved in October, the fourth straight month over 400. But it paled in comparison to October 2019, when 1,073 units were approved, the most in any month since November 2004.

Over the first 10 months of this year, 4,168 housing units have been approved, a one percent decrease from the same period in 2019.

Donald Klepper-Smith, chief economist and director of research for New Haven-based DataCore Partners, said given the current state of Connecticut’s economy, the number of new housing units approved last month “was pretty decent.”

“I think it speaks to the inwardbound migration,” Klepper-Smith said, referring to the pandemicinspired trend of people fleeing other cities to move to Connecticut. “The stock market has become overvalued and people are looking for investment opportunities that are easier for them to understand and feel confident about.”

The largest amount of new housing permit activity for any of the 104 communities reporting in October came out of Fairfield County, with Newtown officials approving 79 units. Stamford officials approved 48 units.

New Haven also approved 48 housing units and 15 were granted in Milford. Further east along the shoreline, Westbrook officials approved 21 housing units.

New housing permit activity is considered a key economic indicator because of the number of jobs associated with it as well as the need to purchase durable goods to go into the homes. Examples of durable consumer goods are appliances, home and office furnishings, lawn and garden equipment as well as consumer electronics.