|
Construction, population boom over in Flathead Valley
January 17, 2012
Editor@montanaliving.com
While Kalispell helped lead the population and construction boom in the last 20 years, Montana's Flathead Valley is showing signs of slowing down.
A report from the Kalispell Planning Department shows that new-home construction is down over 20 percent from 2010.
Of the 10 most populated cities in Montana, Kalispell had the highest growth rate since the 2000
Census. The city of Kalispell had a population of 19,927 on Census Day, April 1, 2010. This
represented a 40.1 percent increase since the 2000 Census and about a 4 percent average annual
population growth. Kalispell remains the 7th largest city in the state.
Local planning officials expect that the population of the area will continue to increase in the long
term, but it is not likely to see the same rate of growth experienced during the past decade. The national
economic and housing situation continues to affect the Flathead Valley as well as other parts of
Western Montana that had rapid growth during the last decade. Loss of jobs and/or lack of job
opportunities that are related to the decline in housing construction may be causing some residents to
leave the area in search of employment, and in the short term, the next three to four years, will actually
contribute to a stable or slightly declining population.
There has been a declining number of new housing starts in Kalispell each year since 2004, in which a
record number of new homes were constructed. While there is still demand for new housing, locally,
there still appears to be a surplus of unoccupied new homes for sale, probably a result of the
nationwide economic situation, as well as several years of speculation in the local housing market.
Once again, the number of new housing unit starts dropped during 2011. There were 72 new housing
unit starts in Kalispell, a 21.7 percent decrease from 2010. Single family home construction was down
16 percent and construction of new townhouses and duplex units was also down 30.8 percent. The
number of new multi-family unit starts were down by 27.6 percent.
The report from the Kalispell Planning Department is available here:
http://www.kalispell.com/planning/documents/kal11report.pdf |
|
