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In the first quarter of 2026, San Francisco, Chicago, New York, and Honolulu were some of the U.S. cities with the highest housing construction costs. Meanwhile, Austin had one of the lowest construction costs for high-end multifamily homes at *** U.S. dollars per square foot. Construction costs for a single-family home in New York ranged between between *** and *** U.S. dollars per square foot. 

Construction cost disparities

As seen here, the construction cost for a high-end multi-family home in San Francisco in the first quarter of 2026 was over more expensive than in cities like Miami, Dallas, and Austin. Meanwhile, there were also great differences in the cost of building a single-family house in New York and in Washington, D.C. or Seattle. Some factors that may cause these disparities are the construction materials, installation, and composite costs, differing land values, wages, etc. For example, although the price of construction materials in the U.S. was rising at a slower level than in 2022 and 2023, several materials that are essential in most construction projects had growth rates of over **** percent in 2024.

Growing industry revenue

Despite the economic uncertainty and other challenges, the size of the private construction market in the U.S. rose during the past years. It is important to consider that supply and demand for housing influences the revenue of this segment of the construction market. On the supply side, single-family home construction fell in 2023, but it is expected to rise in 2024 and 2025. On the demand side, some of the U.S. metropolitan areas with the highest sale prices of single-family homes were located in California, with San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara at the top of the ranking.