Housing starts fall to new record low

Housing starts have fallen to a new record low:

Initial construction of U.S. homes fell to the lowest level on record in January, according to a government report released Wednesday.

Starts fell to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 466,000 in January, according to the Commerce Department. That's the lowest level since the government started keeping records in 1959.

The rate was down 16.8% from December's revised reading of 547,000, and 56.2% lower than January 2008. ...

January marked the fourth consecutive month in which housing starts fell to a new record low. Starts have fallen nearly 80% from their peak of 2.3 million in January 2006. ...

"Building activity is all dried up," said Larson. "Some of it is voluntary cutbacks, because the inventory is excessive. But there are also involuntary cutbacks, as lenders are cutting off funding for developers."

Having the lowest number of housing starts on record is worse than it sounds, because in 1959 the U.S. only had a population of 177.8 million compared to 303.8 million today.