The current upcycle the housing market is in should continue for at least two more years, according to the 2016 U.S. Housing Forum report from Fitch Ratings.
Citing single-family starts, Fitch analysts said Monday in their report that the housing market has "room for at least two more years of expansion." They calculated that single-family starts had risen in five of the past six years.
The report noted that the average length of an upcycle period, when excluding the cycle preceding the most recent financial crisis, was 4.3 years. The last cycle meanwhile featured around 14 years of expansion followed by between five and six years of contraction.
In the report, Fitch uses single-family starts as a proxy for overall housing metrics in the single-family market.
"New-home sales have followed a similar historical pattern, although they have not been quite as volatile as starts," the Fitch analysts wrote.
Single-family starts have risen consistently since 2012, increasing 10.3% last year. While there has been consistent expansion, it has not been as sizeable as in previous housing cycles.
Annual production reached 1.1 million properties including 720,000 single-family homes in 2015. That's below the average of 1.4 million overall properties and 1 million single-family starts, which served as the indication that the current upcycle has room to continue.
