Q1 2026 Permits Split: Single-Family Down 7.6%, Multifamily Up 7.1%

The Data

214,655.

That's the count of single-family building permits issued nationwide in Q1 2026, down 7.6% from the same quarter a year ago, per the Census Bureau Building Permits Survey released Monday by NAHB. Multifamily moved the other way: 121,404 permits, +7.1% YoY. The two product types have decoupled for a second straight quarter.

The state-level decomposition sharpens the story. Only 12 states posted year-over-year gains in single-family permits; 38 declined. Alabama led the gainers at +18.6%. Maryland led the losers at -25.4%. The top 10 permit-issuing states accounted for 63.7% of all single-family activity nationwide.

The Context

Texas held the #1 ranking with 35,231 single-family permits — but down 8.3% vs. Q1 2025, meaning the leader is shrinking alongside the rest. Florida fell 6.7%. North Carolina dropped 15.4%. REI Prime tracked the early-year pullback in Sun Belt builder activity last month, when active inventory in those three states had already rebuilt to March 2019 levels.

NAHB framed the gap as elevated financing costs and softer builder sentiment dragging single-family, while multifamily permits "remained supported by demand for rental housing." Regional patterns reinforce that read: the Midwest was essentially flat on single-family while the Northeast and West saw multifamily permits surge. Single-family is responding to mortgage-rate pressure — the 30-year fixed remains elevated through May — while multifamily permitting is tracking rent demand in markets where for-sale construction has thinned.

Also Moving

• Multifamily starts data diverges from multifamily permits. Census BPS shows starts for five-plus-unit buildings up double-digits YoY through March; a separate property-level quarterly tracking series puts Q1 2026 starts at roughly 55,000 units — the lowest since 2011 (Multifamily Dive). The two series define "start" differently; both point to a thinner 2027 delivery pipeline.
• April new-home purchase applications turned negative. MBA data showed applications down 2.4% YoY in April — the first annual decline since October 2025 (HousingWire). Implied new-home sales SAAR slowed to 655,000 from a revised 717,000 in March.

What to Watch

Three observable signals over the next 30 days:

1. May Census BPS release (mid-June). Whether single-family permits show a fifth consecutive month of YoY declines, or whether the rate of decline narrows.
2. The 12-state gainer list. Alabama's +18.6% and Minnesota's +0.2% bracket the cohort. A single state falling below zero would shrink it to 11.
3. Multifamily YoY in the Midwest and South. The South posted Q1 multifamily declines while the Northeast and West surged. If the South stays negative through Q2, the regional supply gap widens — and the divergence between the Dallas-Fort Worth metro and the Miami metro becomes the second-half story.

Data sources: Census BPS, FRED MORTGAGE30US, NAHB Eye on Housing.