The U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development reported Wednesday morning that new housing starts in October slipped to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.009 million, a decrease of 2.8% from the upwardly revised September rate of 1.038 million, but an increase of 7.8% compared with the October 2013 rate of 936,000. The consensus estimate from a survey of economists expected a rate of around 1.028 million.
The upward revision to the September rate totaled 21,000 new housing starts. The October total would still have been lower, but by less than 1%, except for that revision.
The seasonally adjusted rate of new building permits also rose in October, to 1.080 million, or up 4.8%, from the upwardly revised September rate of 1.031 million and 1.2% above the October 2013 rate of 1.067 million. The consensus estimate called for 1.035 million new permits.
Single-family housing starts rose to an annualized rate of 696,000 in October, up 4.2% from the upwardly revised September rate of 668,000.
Permits for new single-family homes rose 1.4% in October to an adjusted annual rate of 640,000, from an upwardly revised total of 631,000 in September.
Multifamily starts for buildings with five or more units, a more volatile number than single-family starts, fell 1.5% year-over-year in October.
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