Building up: Cities Winning the 'Great Home Building Race'

Dallas approved more than 47,000 homes built in 2017, and Houston had 42,673, the first- and second-most. Yet, San Francisco won 'the great home building race' by doubling its historic average number of permits.

During the second half of last year, San Francisco went from 41.9 to 94.6 percent above the average number of permits. Trulia's analysis of building data found that more building means a city has better odds of beating its historic building average from the previous year. It cited San Francisco, saying that 91.9 percent of the city's permitted homes were buildings with five or more units, driving San Francisco to the top of the ranking.

Does all of this homebuilding mean that inventory and affordability woes will come to end in 2018? Probably not. At 23,257 units, the pricey markets of San Francisco, Boston, and San Jose combined still built fewer units than Austin alone, which finished with 25,803 units. A large share of permits in these markets are multifamily permits, which primarily lead to new rental housing stock, and as such, are likely to put downward pressure on rents, rather than home prices.

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