Construction spending in June fell slightly below that in May the Census Bureau said today.  Overall construction put in place during the month was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $950.2 billion compared to $967.8 billion in May, a decline of 1.8 percent.  The May number is an upward revision of the $956.1 billion originally estimated, a number which was essentially unchanged from April. 

The June rate was 5.5 percent higher than construction spending in June 2013 which was estimated at a rate of $900.3 billion.  At the end of June construction expenditures for the year totaled $445.1 billion, a 7.8 percent increase over the $413.0 billion spent to that date in 2013.

Total residential construction spending was at a rate of $361.3 billion compared to $362.1 billion in May and $337.5 billion in June 2013.  These were differences of -0.2 percent and +7.1 percent respectively.

Private construction spending in June was at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $685.5 billion, down 1.0 percent from the revised (from $682.8 billion) estimate of $692.0 billion for May and 9.2 percent higher than the estimated $627.6 billion in expenditures in June of the previous year.

Private residential construction spending was at a rate of $355.9 billion, down 0.3 from $357.0 billion in May, a revision of the $354.8 billion originally reported for that month.  Private residential construction was up 7.4 percent from June 2013 when the rate was $331.3 billion.

Year to date private construction totaled $324.7 billion at the end of June compared to $291.5 billion at the end of June 2013, an increase of 11.4 percent.  The comparable figures for private residential construction were $166.9 in 2014 and $151.3 billion for 2013, an increase in 2014 of 10.3 percent.

On a non-seasonally adjusted basis there was an estimated $60.7 billion in private construction put in place in June, $33.0 billion of which was residential.  In May the respective figures were $58.9 billion and $31.1 billion.

Total public construction was 4.0 percent lower in June than in May with expenditures at the rate of $264.7 billion and $275.7 billion annually.  May was revised from an original estimate of $273.3 billion.  June expenditures were at a rate 2.9 percent below total private construction estimates in June 2013 of 272.7 billion.

Public residential constructions expenditures were at the rate of $5.4 billion, up 6.3 percent from the May rate of 5.1 billion but 12.3 percent below the estimate of $6.2 billion a year earlier.