US housing starts are due at the bottom of the hour and forecast to rebound to 1.310m after falling to a post-pandemic low last month.

The long-term chart highlights the problem: US housing starts are significantly lower than they were in 1980 despite a 47% increase in US population.

The housing crash led to a bust in home building that was just turning around when the pandemic dawned. Low interest rates briefly spurred more building but that was quickly undone by high rates.

A healthy rate for US home construction is upwards of 1.6m units and I could argue it’s significantly higher than that. Fortunately, as rates begin turning, it should tick towards that.

This article was written by Adam Button at www.forexlive.com.