FMI forecasts 5 percent annual growth in total construction put in place for 2012, to $826 billion, and
as much as 7 percent annual growth for 2013, to $882.4 billion. “That improving growth rate includes a solid recovery in housing, especially multi-family units, and strong growth in power construction,” FMI said on July 17 in its second quarter 2012 Construction Outlook Report. “Other areas, like commercial construction, will awaken from a long slumber to resume slower than traditional growth rates but somewhat ahead of national GDP growth.”
FMI’s forecast for nonresidential construction in 2012 is largely positive: power (+10 percent), amusement and recreation (+4 percent), commercial (+5 percent), communication (+4 percent), lodging (+4 percent), office (+4 percent), health care (+3 percent), manufacturing (+3 percent), sewage and waste disposal (+3 percent), transportation (+3 percent), conservation and development (+2 percent), water supply (+2 percent), educational (+1 percent), religious (0 percent), highway
and street (-2 percent), and public safety (-5 percent). “If 2012 does turn out to be the turning point for construction, it will be a long, slow turn,” FMI said. “That may prove to be a safer road to recovery than a sharp V or U curve.”
FMI predicts greater growth in nonresidential construction in 2013: power (+10 percent), amusement and recreation (+8 percent), commercial (+8 percent), health care (+7 percent), lodging (+7 percent), office (+6 percent), religious (+6 percent), transportation (+5 percent), communication (+4 percent), manufacturing (+4 percent), sewage and waste disposal (+3 percent), water supply (+3 percent), conservation and development (+2 percent), educational (+2 percent), highway and street (+1 percent), and public safety (-1 percent). “The bottom line is that we seem to have risen from the bottom of the Great Recession,” FMI said.
To learn more about this report and other news impacting the construction market, please contact the construction professionals of McKonly and Asbury, LLP.
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