Housing starts surge past year-ago levels

February's housing starts presented a clear victory over 2015 levels, with a 30.9% year-over-year increase that was likely buoyed by unseasonably warm winter weather.

However, there were vast regional disparities that played into the picture.

Starts in the Northeast declined by as much as 51.3% from the previous month, even though they were up 58.7% year-over-year.

Strong performance across the rest of the country (with the West rising as much as 26.1%) helped tilt the scales into a favorable direction, and year-over-year performance was a boom across the board, with starts rising as much as 77.5% in the Midwest.

 Overall, housing starts came in at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,178,000 in February, up 5.2% from January's revised estimate of 1,120,000. That's also up substantially from February 2015's rate of 900,000, as mentioned above.

Single-family starts performed even better on a monthly basis, rising 7.2% to a rate of 822,000 from January's revised rate of 767,000.

The road ahead doesn't look quite as promising, however. Building permits were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,167,000, which is down 3.1% from January's revised rate of 1,204,000, and up 6.3% year-over-year.

Single-family permits are looking to come out ahead of the average, though, with a rate of 731,000 up 0.4% from January's rate.