Economists project the housing sector will contribute to economic growth nationally for the first time since 2008, Bloomberg News reported.

Multi-family units will lead the construction industry out of their rut, according to Michelle Meyer, a senior economist at Bank of America, and Celia Chen, an economist at Moody’s Analytics. Meyer predicts that work will begin on 260,000 apartment buildings and townhouse developments countrywide in 2012 — up 45 percent from last year, while Chen projects 310,000 developments will break ground, an improvement of 74 percent from 2011. [more]

Last month saw the third highest foreclosure rate on record, according to CNBC’s real estate reporter Diana Olick, raising questions over whether this month is an anomaly or the start of a heightened foreclosure environment. Michelle Meyer, vice president at Barclays Capital, told CNBC that there are a large number of seriously delinquent mortgages in the field right now, causing a possible acceleration of foreclosures in the near future. According to Meyer, her group expects to see another 6 million foreclosures pop up over the coming three years. [more]