After a record-breaking year, London area housing construction got off to a cold start in January, because of a lack of multi-family units.

The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) said there 67 housing starts in the London-St. Thomas area in January, including 59 single-family homes and eight townhouses and semi units.

The single family starts were almost equal to last January, but there were no apartment starts in contrast to Jan. 2017 when apartment starts spiked to 406, as some large apartment buildings got underway.

CMHC analyst Amran Wali said the more consistent single-family home starts are still in good shape, but the more volatile multi-family starts are pulling back after a flurry of construction in 2017.

“As the under construction inventory of multi unit homes has reached a level that is amongst the highest ever recorded, builders have held back on starting new projects until existing projects have been completed,” said Wali.

Last year London area home builders broke the record for annual starts in November with a year-to-date total of 3,967

There were another 202 housing starts in December in the London census area which includes St. Thomas and Strathroy.

That pushed the number of housing starts for 2017 to 3,967 units.

The old record of 3,674 starts was set back in 2006.