Houston Had The Most Construction Activity In Nation Over Past Decade. 2 Other Texas Cities Weren't Far Behind
Houston was the top city for real estate construction over the past decade, leading the country in single-family homebuilding permits and industrial square footage constructed, according to a new report from StorageCafe.
High-growth Sun Belt markets, particularly in Texas, were by far the most active, per the report.
StorageCafe ranked San Antonio and Austin as the U.S. cities with the most real estate construction after Houston. In all, 15 of the top 20 cities for real estate development are in the Sun Belt, the storage space marketplace reported.
Houston racked up more than 55,000 single-family permits during the last decade. Fort Worth was the only other U.S. city with permits in the 50,000 range, recording about 50,600.
Houston also saw 65.9M SF of industrial space constructed, according to the report.
San Antonio snagged the second spot in StorageCafe’s national ranking for a combination of its industrial, single-family and self-storage sectors. San Antonio added 22.6M SF of industrial space, 5.7M SF of office space and 9.3M SF of retail space over the past 10 years, according to the report.
Austin was third nationally, following New York City and Los Angeles, for the number of multifamily permits issued with about 98,700. Houston had about 89,400 multifamily permits.
Austin was also third in StorageCafe’s ranking of most overall real estate development. Out of the almost 99,000 multifamily permits issued throughout the decade, about 15,000 were in 2022. It also added 4.3M SF of self-storage space.
Across the nation, self-storage added 25% of its total stock over the past decade, more than any other commercial asset class. Self-storage tends to thrive during good and bad times in the economy, posting its most active year in 2019, according to the report.
Industrial added the next highest percentage with 13% of its stock being built during the past 10 years. More than 3.5B SF of industrial space was built nationwide from 2013 to 2022, the report says.
