Residential construction in Northwest Arkansas down 17% to start the year

Residential permit values from January and February totaled a combined $67.51 million for Bentonville, Fayetteville, Rogers and Springdale, a drop of 17% compared to $81.43 million from the same period a year ago.

The number of single-family permits is down 16% through the first two months — 264 this year compared to 315 in the same period of 2016.

Building activity is heaviest in Fayetteville and Bentonville, with 88 and 80 permits, respectively. Bentonville, though, has the highest collective value at $23.76 million, compared to $19.78 million in Fayetteville.

In Rogers there were 63 permits valued at $15.29 million in January and February. That’s up slightly from 55 permits in the same period in 2017, with a combined value of $16.75 million.

Residential building permits in Springdale numbered 33 through the first two months, the lowest number since the start of 2015.

The single-family building permit numbers through the first two months continue the downward trend from 2017, when annual building activity in the region’s four largest cities was collectively down 18% from the previous year.

In Bella Vista, however, the homebuilding trend remains sharply upward. There were 38 residential permits issued in the city through the first two months, with a combined value of $9.91 million. That compares to 26 and $5.92 million in the January-February period of 2017, and 13 and $3.43 million in the same two months of 2016.

Single-family building permits totaled 194 last year in Bella Vista. That was up from 98 permits in 2016, 68 in 2015 and 51 in 2014.