Housing starts slip in October

October housing starts declined from the upwardly adjusted pace in September, but stayed above the million mark.

The seasonally adjusted annual rate of new housing units started came in at 1,009,000, down 2.8% from the prior month.

Compared with a year ago, total starts increased 7.8%.

On a single-family basis, starts increased 4.2% in the month, and 15.4% for the year. The pace of single-family housing starts in October was 696,000.

Building permits produced positive stats. In October, the rate of permit issuing was 1,080,000, up 4.8% from September, and up 1.2% from the October 2013 estimate. Single-family building permits were up 1.4% compared with the prior month, and up 2.4% compared with the same month last year.

[The above story has been corrected to include the accurate year-over-year gain of single-family housing starts.]