Housing Starts
How many new homes builders broke ground on -- a direct, timely read on housing-sector momentum.
What it is
Housing Starts counts the number of new residential construction projects that began during the month, reported as a seasonally-adjusted annualized rate (e.g. "1.35 million" means the pace that month, if sustained for a full year, would produce 1.35 million new homes). Housing is one of the most interest-rate-sensitive parts of any economy, since most home purchases and construction financing depend on borrowing.
Why it's watched as an early rate-sensitivity signal
Because housing is so rate-sensitive, Housing Starts is often one of the first sectors to visibly react when a central bank changes policy -- a string of rate hikes typically shows up in falling housing starts well before it shows up in broader GDP or employment data, making this a relatively early read on how much traction monetary policy is actually getting on the real economy.
Worked example
If housing starts are expected to hold around 1.35 million (annualized) after several months of rate hikes, and instead fall sharply to 1.25 million, that's read as early confirmation that tighter policy is starting to bite the real economy -- ahead of that same slowdown necessarily showing up yet in jobs or broader growth data.
See Housing Starts live
Macrolens tracks this release and scores it into the composite -- free to start, no credit card required.