SACRAMENTO – Total housing starts in California continued to gain ground in June and posted the largest monthly total since December of 2008, the California Building Industry Association announced today.

According to statistics compiled by the Construction Industry Research Board (CIRB), permits were pulled for 4,238 total housing units in June, up 19 percent from the same month a year ago and up 34 percent from May. It was the largest monthly total since December of 2008 when 4,658 total permits had been issued. Permits for single-family homes totaled 2,628, down 9 percent from June 2009 but up 33 percent from the previous month, while multifamily permits totaled 1,610, up 140 percent from a year ago and up 35 percent from May.

For the first half of the year, permits were pulled for 21,149 units, up 17 percent when compared to the first half of 2009 when 18,083 permits were issued. Single-family permits were up 8 percent while multifamily permits rose 35 percent.

Liz Snow, CBIA’s President and CEO, welcomed the positive numbers but continued to express caution in the face of production levels still hovering around record lows.

“This is welcomed news for the industry, the economy, and for the people who will be employed because of the increase in construction,” said Snow. “But the fact remains that we’re still hovering around the record-low production levels of the past two years, and the industry is still facing an uphill battle in the wake of a stabilizing housing market and high unemployment. We’re still expecting a modest improvement over last year and hope that the state tax credits for homebuyers will continue to help chip away at the inventory of unsold homes so that job-generating new-home construction can get back to healthy levels in the near future.”