Lennar projects housing market shift in 2014

One of the leading homebuilders in the nation expects South Florida’s housing market to shift from steady growth to stabilization.

Miami-based Lennar enjoyed gains in revenues and home deliveries last year, but the company is projecting a 2014 slowdown in the residential sector’s dramatic recovery from the recession, Miami Today reported. Lennar’s Southeast Florida segment delivered 1,741 houses in 2013, an increase from 1,314 in 2012. The company delivered 18,290 homes nationally last year, which is also an increase from previous years.

Lennar expects to deliver between 21,000 and 22,000 homes nationally in 2014. But gross margins are projected to remain at 25 percent this year.

“We have seen the rate of improvement in the overall housing market moderate due to the tapering of federal stimulus and the recent upward movement in mortgage rates from their historically low levels,” Lennar said in its annual report. [Miami Today] — Eric Kalis