Investment in Building Construction up 60% in May

Investment in building construction across Canada increased 60.1% to $13.4 billion in May, rebounding from large declines in April.

Investment in building construction, seasonally adjusted (Statistics Canada)

The easing of COVID-19 construction restrictions in May, most notably in Ontario and Quebec, led to growth in all components of residential and non-residential investment.

Despite rebounding strongly in May, investment levels remained 16.5% below the pre-shut down period of February 2020.

Residential Rise

Investment in residential construction rose 57.0% to $8.4 billion in May. Investment in single-unit construction was up 71.7% to $4.1 billion, exceeding multi-unit growth which increased 45.2% to $4.3 billion.

Although Ontario and Quebec reported the largest provincial gains for the month, all provinces bounced back from sharp declines in April. Despite these gains, residential investment remained 22.7% lower than February 2020, before COVID-19-related restrictions were put in place.

Commercial almost doubles

Non-residential construction investment increased 65.6% to $4.9 billion in May over April. All three components of non-residential investment increased, with gains in Ontario and Quebec more than offsetting declines in five other provinces.

The commercial component represented the majority of non-residential construction gains, up 99.0% to $2.9 billion. Nearly all of the increase was in Ontario and Quebec, with both provinces returning to more regular construction activity. Manitoba (+0.4%) was the only other province to report growth for the month in this component.

Gains in both the industrial (+35.1%) and institutional (+32.9%) sectors were also led by increases in Ontario and Quebec. Nationally, while reporting notable improvements, these components were still down 4.7% and 0.8%, respectively, from February levels.