A Decade in Residential Construction in Arizona: Metro Phoenix Ranks Fourth in Top 10 Largest Metros with the Most Permits Issued in 2022

The most recent banking troubles, rising inflation, and prohibitive mortgage rates are some of the issues affecting the housing market at the moment. And the latest data supports the fact that the market is losing momentum: While the number of completed units has increased every year since 2012, permits and housing starts are dropping nationwide. Arizona follows the trend, with a Y-o-Y drop in permits of -6.51%.

To get a deeper understanding of how housing construction and construction employment trends evolved over the past decade in Arizona and not only, Point2 analyzed historical data on permits, completed and started units, along with employment, incomes, and business data. The report is accompanied by an extensive resource page highlighting the Y-o-Y changes in residential construction over the last decade in all the states and 384 U.S. metros.

Findings for Arizona show that:

• The state ranks sixth for the highest total number of permits issued in 2022, with 61,084 permits issued. Texas, Florida, and California top this list;
• Arizona also boasts the seventh highest number of permits for single-family homes: 37,326 permits issued in 2022;
• Zooming in to metro level, 47,369 permits were authorized in the Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler area, which puts the AZ metro in the fourth position, right after the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington (77,281 permits), Houston-The Woodlands-Sugarland (75,786 permits) and New York- Newark-Jersey City (58,991 permits) metros;
• However, all major Arizona metros recorded Y-o-Y decreases in the number of permits issued in 2022 compared to 2021: -8.74% in Tucson and -6.35% in Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler;
• Smaller metros like Yuma and Flagstaff saw even more significant drops in the number of permits from 2021 to 2022: -34.16% and -29.78%, respectively;
• The number of both construction employees and construction businesses within the state increased over the past decade: by 2022, the number of employees active in the construction industry exceeded 192,000 and there were 25.75% more businesses;
• The Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler and Tucson metros have the highest number of construction employees in Arizona, with Phoenix-Mesa-Chandler boasting more than 148,000 employees.

Check out the full set of data and accompanying visuals here.