Residential home building permits saw a boost

The value of building permits taken out by contractors in southwestern British Columbia shot up 40 per cent from June to July to $427.5 million, Statistics Canada reported Tuesday.

That represented the glimmer of a silver lining in an otherwise gloomy picture of British Columbia's construction sector as far as Keith Sashaw, president of the Vancouver Regional Construction Association is concerned.

"We've seen a few months now of strong increases in building permit activity, especially on the residential side," Sashaw said in an interview.

Increased permits, he added, coupled with three months of increased job creation this summer following thousands of job cuts over the previous seven months, "bodes well that we've probably seen the worst of the recession and its impact on the construction industry."

Overall, however, the increases in permit activity seen in the Lower Mainland region represent somewhat of a recovery from lower levels as the building intentions of builders nearly collapsed this year from their levels of 2008.

Sashaw, in a report, noted that total building permits issued in the region to the end of July were only 52 per cent of the value of permits issued during the same period in 2008.

Across British Columbia, the planning activity of builders declined slightly in July from June as contractors took out some $618.6 million worth of building permits in July, Statistics Canada reported Tuesday.

That compares with $634 million in permits that builders took out in June, with Statistics Canada attributing the decline solely to a drop in non-residential permit activity.

"Provincially, Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia reported decreases in all three components [of non-residential construction]," Statistics Canada said in its report.

And planned building activity remains well behind levels of a year ago as July's total value of permits was still some 30 per cent below the $890.2 million that builders booked in July 2008.

July's permit values, while almost stable when compared to June, indicate that "by a long shot, the construction industry isn't out of the woods yet," according to Philip Hochstein, president of the Independent Contractors and Business Association of B.C.

"As we finish building through the backlog of projects from 2008 and 2009, there's not a lot coming forward in 2010, so next year will be a very challenging year for B.C. contractors," he added.

While construction employment edged up in the Lower Mainland during August, according to the latest Statistics Canada labour force survey released last Friday, the sector still lost 1,400 jobs across the province and was down 35,200 positions compared with August a year ago.

On a provincial basis, residential permits saw an almost 20 per cent boost from June applications that were worth almost $374 million in July. That, however, was still 40 per cent lower than their level a year ago.

Non-residential permit applications across the province shrank 24 per cent from June to applications worth $245 million in July. That was almost nine per cent below permit activity in July of 2008.

Tuesday's report said that municipalities issued about $2.6 billion in residential permits in July, representing a drop of 4.1 per cent. A 19.3 per cent decrease was recorded for non-residential permits, coming in at about $2 billion.

('Lower Mainland permits a silver lining for B.C. construction" prepared by Derrick Penner/Vancouver Sun)