WASHINGTON - U.S. housing starts rose 10.9 percent last month, beating expectations and marking the biggest jump in more than seven years, as groundbreaking activity increased across the nation, a Commerce Department report showed on Wednesday.
Housing starts rose to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 2.004 million units in December from an upwardly revised 1.807 million pace a month earlier, the government said. That was the largest one-month gain since an 11.2 percent increase in September 1997.
Wall Street economists had expected housing starts to increase to a 1.90 million unit pace from the 1.771 million rate initially reported for November.
For the full year, housing starts rose 5.7 percent to 1.953 million. That is the slowest rate of increase since 2.2 percent in 2001.
Source: Reuters