If you haven’t noticed, we’ve been building lots of apartment buildings in Maryland. That’s about to end.

For years, the U.S. Census Bureau has been compiling and publishing data from local jurisdictions on building permits for new housing. That includes buildings with five or more units, or what we generally call an apartment building.

Just because a permit is issued doesn’t necessarily mean a structure is getting built. But this data indicates where the housing construction market is headed.

Maryland had a relatively big spike in permits for apartment buildings in 2022, and many of those are now open or opening soon.

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At one point, the total number of proposed apartment units outpaced single-family homes permitted in Maryland.

While most new apartment buildings were planned for the city of Baltimore and the D.C. suburbs, permits for single-family homes were spread out more evenly throughout the state.

According to the real estate data firm CoStar, some areas have seen a spike in vacancy rates in new apartment buildings, which are often classified as “4 & 5-star” buildings. Most developers just call them “luxury.”

That spike in vacant units could recede soon. The number of permits for new apartment buildings has fallen rapidly since 2022, meaning far fewer units will open in the coming years.