Housing Starts Up 5% in February

The U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development reported Wednesday morning that new housing starts in February rose to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.178 million. That was an increase of 5.2% from the upwardly revised January rate of 1.120 million and an increase of 30.9% compared with the February 2015 rate of 900,000. The consensus estimate from a survey of economists expected a rate of around 1.175 million.

The revision to the January rate added 21,000 new housing starts to the previously reported total.

The seasonally adjusted rate of new building permits slipped in February to 1.167 million, down 3.1% from the upwardly revised January rate of 1.204 million and 6.3% above the February 2015 rate of 1.098 million. The consensus estimate called for 1.224 million new building permits.
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Single-family housing starts rose to an annualized rate of 822,000 in January, up 7.2% from the revised January rate of 767,000. Single-family starts rose 37% year over year in January.

Permits for new single-family homes rose 0.4% month over month in February to an adjusted annual rate of 731,000 from a revised total of 728,000 in January.

Multifamily starts for buildings with five or more units, a more volatile number than single-family starts, rose by 16.8% year over year in February and by 2.4% compared with January.