Housing starts, an economic indicator of future housing demand, fell yet again for the seventh-straight month in January as the economy continued to stall and the housing market continued to see little-to-no progress in improving.

The U.S. Commerce Department said housing starts fell 16.8% to a seasonally-adjusted rate of 466,000 units, on top of the 14.5% drop that occurred in December.

The drop was much bigger than what economists were looking for, who expected that housing starts would fall approximately 5% in January, according to data provided by Thomson Reuters.

“Effectively, builders have thrown in the towel given the large number of foreclosures that continue to plague the market as well as the overhang of existing new homes that haven’t sold yet, all of which makes building and selling new homes impossible,” said Dan Greenhaus, chief market strategist with Miller Tabak.

The drop to 466,000 annualized units now brings the economic indicator to a record low. Year over year, housing starts were 56.2% below the pace of construction in January 2008.

Import Prices

Import prices, which are used to gauge the threat of inflation in an economy, fell by 1.1% in January, the Labor Department said on Wednesday.

The drop was milder than what economists had expected, who predicted that import prices would fall 1.5% during the month.

Import prices have primarily dropped in the past several months as the U.S. economy has slowed and the prices of major commodities -- most notably oil -- which has fallen from $147 a barrel last summer to $35 a barrel this week.

According to the Commerce Department, import prices are down 12.5% compared to a year ago -- it’s the biggest drop since 1982.

Excluding petroleum, import prices were down 0.8% from December, and were 0.6% lower from a year ago.