Jobs report: Construction sector adds 11,000 jobs in September

The September job report was released this morning, coming in hot for overall jobs added, while massive job growth did not materialize in the construction sector. The report shows only 11,000 jobs were added for the month. Yahoo Finance Reporter Dani Romero breaks down the latest for construction job numbers and what it means for the housing market at large.

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Video Transcript

- September jobs report, that came out and construction was one of the few sectors that saw little change over the past month. Let's bring in Yahoo Finance's Dani Romero to break down the numbers here. Hey, Dani.

DANI ROMERO: Brad, this was expected for the construction sector. Construction employment added 11,000 jobs in September, and a Realtor.com economist tells me that this is below the 12 month average. But breaking down to those numbers, construction of buildings added 6,500 jobs.

And diving into the subsections of that, we have residential building construction added 6,700 jobs. That is a big gain compared to last month. There's been some rebound in construction spending, so that gave it a little bit of that boost there.

Non-residential building construction jobs, that is, those are jobs that build our hospitals, schools, that lost some steam and momentum there. But moving over to the heavy and civil engineering construction, that gained 2,200 jobs. Those are jobs, remember, that build our highways, dams, roads, streets. That got a boost from the CHIPS Act funding.

Then moving over to the specialty trade, contractors overall gained 2,600 jobs. And so the subsections in that is residential specialty trade saw the most momentum there, 5,900 jobs, while non-residential specialty trade lost 3,300 jobs. Brad.

- Dani, real quick here. What does this all signal about the overall housing market? Because we know a lot of the homebuilders, they haven't been able to keep up with some of the demand out there. Given the fact that existing home sales, simply, there are not nearly enough to meet the demand out there, so what that tell us just about housing going forward?

DANI ROMERO: Seana, you bring up a really good point. Builders are in a well and great position right now to build some of the inventory to the scarce market, even amid higher mortgage rates. The construction sector is really strong right now. And the fact that there is government spending, that is something to really highlight both on the public and private side of things.

So Seana, this report really was from one economist, he said that this is what was expected and also wasn't much of a surprise, given the fact the overall jobs report result. Seana.

- Dani, I'll take it from here. Thanks so much for that update and tracking this very important part of the employment situation here. Dani Romero, Yahoo Finance's own.