Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment Request; Survey of Housing Starts, Sales, and Completions (SOC)

Issuing agencies

Full Text

<html>
<head>
<title>Federal Register, Volume 91 Issue 209 (Friday, October 30, 2026)</title>
</head>
<body><pre>
[Federal Register Volume 91, Number 209 (Friday, October 30, 2026)]
[Notices]
[Pages 68486-68487]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2026-22171]


=======================================================================
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

Census Bureau


Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the 
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment 
Request; Survey of Housing Starts, Sales, and Completions (SOC)

    The Department of Commerce will submit the following information 
collection request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for 
review and clearance in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 
1995, on or after the date of publication of this notice. We invite the 
general public and other Federal agencies to comment on proposed, and 
continuing information collections, which helps us assess the impact of 
our information collection requirements and minimize the public's 
reporting burden. Public comments were previously requested via the 
Federal Register on July 20, 2026 during a 60-day comment period. This 
notice allows for an additional 30 days for public comments.
    Agency: U.S. Census Bureau, Commerce.
    Title: Survey of Housing Starts, Sales, and Completions (SOC).
    OMB Control Number: 0607-0110.
    Form Number(s): SOC-QI/SF.1; SOC-QI/MF.1.
    Type of Request: Regular submission, Request for an Extension, 
without Change, of a Currently Approved Collection Change.
    Number of Respondents: We sample 19,353 new buildings each year. 
This results in an estimated 177,702 interviews per year.
    Average Hours per Response: 5 minutes.
    Burden Hours: 14809.
    Needs and Uses: The U.S. Census Bureau plans to request a revision 
and three-year extension of the current Office of Management and Budget 
(OMB) clearance of the Survey of Housing Starts, Sales and Completions, 
also known as the Survey of Construction (SOC). The SOC is co-sponsored 
by the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban 
Development (HUD). The SOC collects monthly data on new residential 
construction from a sample of owners or builders. The Census Bureau 
uses the Computer-Assisted Personal Interviewing (CAPI) electronic 
questionnaires SOC-QI/SF.1 and SOC-QI/MF.1 to collect data on start and 
completion dates of construction, physical characteristics of the 
structure (floor area, number of bathrooms, type of heating system, 
etc.), and if applicable, date of sale, sales price, and type of 
financing. Data collected through the SOC provide widely used measures 
of construction activity, including the economic indicators Housing 
Starts, Housing Completions, and New Residential Sales. The current 
clearance for this survey is scheduled to expire on March 31, 2027.
    Beginning in January 2027, the SOC will no longer be covering a 
sample of non-permit-issuing areas. Non-permit estimates have steadily 
decreased over time and now represent less than 1% of our single-family 
estimates, the cost and difficulty in collecting the data is no longer 
worth the benefit. Instead, SOC will note that the estimates for 2027 
forward are based only on permit-issuing areas.
    The Census Bureau uses the information collected in the SOC to 
publish estimates of the number of new residential housing units 
started, under construction, completed, and the number of new houses 
sold and for sale. The Census Bureau also publishes many financial and 
physical characteristics of new housing units. Government agencies use 
these statistics to evaluate economic policy, measure progress towards 
the national housing goal, make policy decisions, and formulate 
legislation. For example, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve 
System uses data from this survey to evaluate the effect of interest 
rates on housing sales and construction. The Bureau of Economic 
Analysis uses the data in developing Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The 
private sector uses the information for estimating the demand for 
building materials and the many products used in new housing and to 
schedule production, distribution, and sales efforts. The financial 
community uses the data to estimate the demand for short-term 
(construction loans) and long-term (mortgages) borrowing.
    Frequency: Monthly.
    Respondent's Obligation: Voluntary.
    Legal Authority: Title 13, United States Code, Sections 8(b), 131 
and 182; Title 12 U.S.C., Sections 1701z-1 and 1701z-2g.
    This information collection request may be viewed at 
<a href="http://www.reginfo.gov">www.reginfo.gov</a>. Follow the instructions to view the Department of 
Commerce collections currently under review by OMB.
    Written comments and recommendations for the proposed information 
collection should be submitted within 30 days of the publication of 
this notice on the following website <a href="http://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain">www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain</a>. 
Find this particular information collection by selecting ``Currently 
under 30-day Review--Open for Public Comments'' or by using the search 
function and

[[Page 68487]]

entering either the title of the collection or the OMB Control Number 
0607-0110.

Sheleen Dumas,
Departmental PRA Compliance Officer, Office of the Under Secretary for 
Economic Affairs, Commerce Department.
[FR Doc. 2026-22171 Filed 10-29-26; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-07-P


</pre></body>
</html>