The seasonally adjusted rate of new building permits rose to 1.08 million, which is 8% above the downwardly revised March rate of 1 million but 3.8% higher than the April 2013 rate of 1.04 million. The consensus estimate called for 1.02 million new permits.
Single-family housing starts rose to an annualized rate of 649,000 in April, up 0.7% from the revised March rate of 644,000.
Permits for new single-family homes rose 0.3% in April to an adjusted annual rate of 602,000 from an upwardly revised total of 600,000 in March.
Multifamily starts for buildings with five or more units, a more volatile number than single-family starts, rose 42.9% in April.
The rate of increase in new permits is the highest since June of 2008.
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