The U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development reported Tuesday morning that new housing starts in November slipped to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.028 million, a decrease of 1.6% from the upwardly revised October rate of 1.045 million and a decrease of 7% compared with the November 2013 rate of 1.105 million. The consensus estimate from a survey of economists expected a rate of around 1.038 million.

The upward revision to the October rate totaled 36,000 new housing starts.

The seasonally adjusted rate of new building permits also slipped in November, to 1.035 million, down 5.2% from the upwardly revised September rate of 1.092 million and 0.2% below the November 2013 rate of 1.037 million. The consensus estimate called for 1.06 million new permits.

Single-family housing starts fell to an annualized rate of 677,000 in November, down 5.4% from the upwardly revised October rate of 716,000.

Permits for new single-family homes fell 1.2% in November, to an adjusted annual rate of 639,000 from an upwardly revised total of 647,000 in September.

Multifamily starts for buildings with five or more units, a more volatile number than single-family starts, fell 11.1% year-over-year in November.

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