Outlays for construction projects fell 0.1% in February to $1.844 trillion, the Commerce Department reported Monday.
Wall Street was expecting construction spending to be unchanged from the previous month.
Spending in January rose a revised 0.4% to $1.845 trillion, up from the prior estimate of a 0.1% drop.
Over the past year, construction spending is up 5.2%.
Total private construction spending was unchanged in February. Private residential construction fell 0.6%, with single-family construction dropping by 1.8%. Private nonresidential spending rose by 0.7%.
Total public construction fell by 0.2%. Residential public construction rose by 0.1%, while nonresidential public construction fell by 0.2% last month.
The housing construction data continues to show a divergence between single- and multifamily development: Multifamily construction spending is outpacing single-family. Month over month, multifamily construction spending rose 1.4%, versus a 1.8% drop in spending for single-family construction. Year over year, multifamily construction spending was up 22.2% versus spending on single-family construction, which was down 21.4%.
Stocks
SPX,
DJIA,
were up in early trading on Monday. The 10-year Treasury note
TMUBMUSD10Y,
fell below 3.5%.
