Construction spending stalled in January. Publicly funded spending rose slightly from December but that was offset by reductions in most areas of private construction. Residential construction did remain in the black, due to a slight increase in single-family building.

Total construction spending was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1.263 trillion, essentially unchanged from December. The figure was an increase of 3.2 percent compared to January 2017.

On an unadjusted basis the value of construction put in place dropped from $96.200 billion in December to $86.912 billion in January. The monthly decline was shared by every construction category.

Privately funded construction dollars spent were at a seasonally adjusted rate of $962.733 billion, a -0.5 percent change from December, but up 1.7 percent compared to January 2017. On an unadjusted basis spending dropped from $75.129 billion in December to $67.950 billion the following month. Month-over-month spending was down in eight of the 13 discrete private construction categories.

Residential spending, at a seasonally adjusted rate of $523.165 billion, was 0.3 percent above the December 2018 rate and up 4.2 percent year-over-year.  Spending on single-family construction was stronger than the sector as a whole, rising 0.6 percent for the month and 8.8 percent on an annual basis. This offset a decline in multi-family construction spending of 1.3 percent and 2.4 percent for the two earlier periods.

On a non-seasonally adjusted basis there was $34.724 billion spent in January on residential construction, $19.284 of which was for the single-family category. In December the respective figures were $38.028 billion and $20.566 billion.  One month into 2018, year-to-date spending is running 4.3 percent ahead of 2017 in overall residential and 9.0 percent in single-family spending.

In the public sector, spending was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $300.051 billion in January up 1.8 percent from December and 8.2 percent from January 2017. The strongest sectors for both monthly and annual spending were Education (up 9.0 and 37.7 percent respectively) and health care (21.6 and 30.1 percent).  Residential spending, at a rate of $6.713 billion, was 4.3 percent lower than in December but 10.3 percent higher for the year.