Real estate construction spending keeps $1 trillion pace

The U.S. Census Bureau of the Department of Commerce today announced that construction spending during July was estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1.099.3 trillion, down slightly from the revised June estimate of $1,099.7 trillion but 6 percent above the July 2004 estimate.

During the first seven months of this year, construction spending amounted to $617.9 billion, approximately 9.3 percent above the $565.4 billion for the same period in 2004.

Spending on private construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $856.2 billion, about 0.2 percent above the revised June estimate of $854.5 billion. Residential construction was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $615.8 billion in July, approximately 0.2 percent above the revised June estimate of $614.6 billion.

More detailed data is available online at http://www.census.gov/constructionspending. In interpreting changes in the statistics in this release, note that month-to-month changes in seasonally adjusted statistics often show movements that may be irregular. The Census Bureau reports that it may take two months to establish an underlying trend for total construction and as long as eight months for specific categories of construction.

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