Housing construction plunged to a record low in April as a steep drop in apartment building offset a rebound in single-family construction. Permits for new projects also hit a new low.

The Commerce Department said Tuesday that construction of new homes and apartments fell 12.8 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 458,000 units, the lowest pace on records going back a half-century.

Even in last month's big decline, there were some signs of stabilization. Construction of single-family homes rose 2.8 percent to an annual rate of 368,000, following a 0.3 percent gain in March and no change in February. The stability in single-family construction likely will be viewed as a hopeful sign that the three-year slide in housing could be bottoming out.
The weakness last month came in the more volatile multifamily sector where construction plunged 46.1 percent to an annual rate of 90,000 units after a 23 percent fall in March.
Housing construction fell 30.6 percent in the Northeast, the largest drop for any region. Housing starts dropped 21.4 percent in the Midwest and 21.1 percent in the South.

The nation's top three homebuilders reported financial results earlier this month that give little hope the spring selling season will be strong enough to stop the red ink.

While all this sounds gloomy, it's a process that we must go through if we are going to get to a bottom. We need to work off the current supply of unsold homes. We do not need builders building tons on new inventory that just sits vacant.