Mark Purcell, left, and Erik Rogers, both framers with Bowden Complete Homes and Framing, work Friday on a new home at 1547 Hanscom Road in east Lawrence. For the first half of 2008, only 47 new homes were constructed in Lawrence.

It would have been a good month – 47 new single-family homes springing from the Lawrence ground.

That type of month is the kind that keeps builders on their toes, and more importantly marks a return to the go-go ’90s when construction kept the gears of the local economy well-oiled.

But neither local builders, nor the economy, had that type of month. Instead, 47 was the total number of Lawrence single-family housing starts for the first six months of the year.

“It’s bad,” said Bobbie Flory, executive director of the Lawrence Home Builders Association. “The national homebuilders association says we haven’t had a downturn in our industry like this since the Depression.”

Those looking for signs of a turnaround in the local economy won’t find them in the city’s mid-year building permit totals.

To put the recent numbers in perspective, the city for nearly a dozen consecutive years started more than 300 new homes per year. That level of building, however, hasn’t happened in the city since 2004.

Last year, builders hoped they had hit the bottom. At this time last year, they had started 95 new single-family homes, and were crying uncle from the grips of a national housing slowdown. Come to find out, the pain was just getting started.

“Folks are really struggling,” Flory said of her membership. “There are a lot of businesses involved in the building of a house, and they’re all trying to survive on such slow building activity.”

Home sales

Home sale numbers are not any more encouraging. Marion Johnson, the Douglas County Appraiser, said his office has recorded 927 sales in the county through June.

That’s down from about 1,200 sales in the same time period last year, which was far from a record-setting season.

“From where I’m sitting, I’m not seeing any signs of a turnaround,” Johnson said.

There is one bright light, however. The average price of a home is up in 2008. Thus far, the average sale price of all homes in the county is $197,000. That’s up about 5.9 percent. If those numbers hold, government leaders may actually dance a jig in the lobby of City Hall.

An increase in housing prices would be a solid sign that housing buyers are gaining more confidence. And more important to government budget makers, it would produce an increase in property tax revenues.

But Johnson expects that bright light soon will dim. He said the increased prices likely are a statistical anomaly resulting from the relatively small number of home sales. By the end of the year, he expects the average price paid for a Douglas County home will be flat or down slightly from a year ago.

Johnson said it was too soon for him to predict what the housing market might do in 2009. But some city leaders are preparing for tough times. City Commissioner Rob Chestnut said the city should plan on tight budgets for both 2009 and 2010. He said a turnaround wasn’t likely, in his opinion, until oil prices stabilized and the national mortgage market got its serious credit questions resolved.

“I hope I’m wrong about how long this will take, but I think we have to plan for that type of risk,” Chestnut said.

Rays of hope

The tough times have begun to bring out the signs of a stiff-upper-lip strategy. Some community leaders are beginning to get past the gloom-and-doom talk and look for signs that will perk up the populace.

City Commissioner Sue Hack said she hoped the economy would gain a firmer footing after the November presidential elections when the investors would no longer be facing the uncertainty of who will be the nation’s next leader.

And she also thinks individuals may adopt a strong attitude of perseverance.

“I don’t think we can afford to be pessimistic,” Hack said. “There is a lot of fear. We can wallow in it, or we can acknowledge it and move forward the best we can.”

Flory is hard pressed to point to any tangible positive that has come out of this downturn, but she does hope that the slowdown has created a change in community attitude. She believes this slowdown will end up touching everyone’s pocketbooks. The county and school district are both contemplating mill levy increases because of lower than normal property tax revenues. The city is poised to ask voters to approve two new sales taxes.

“Hopefully, the positive of all this is a greater awareness that growth is important to keep a community viable and healthy,” Flory said.

Chestnut’s message of optimism is that he believes the Lawrence economy may bounce back sooner than others around the country. He said he thought Lawrence’s housing market began to turn downward sooner than others, which leads him to believe we may be closer to a recovery.

None of that helps with the tightening grip of the here and now. It has left Flory to admittedly plead like a broken record to consumers.

“I just keep saying that it is a great time to buy a home,” Flory said. “Interest rates are low, inventory is high and builders are motivated to sell.”