According to a joint release from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. Census Bureau, housing starts in June were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,467,000 units. This is 2.3 percent higher than the 1,434,000 figure for May and a whopping 25.2 percent below the revised figure of 1,819,000 for June, 2006.

Single-family housing starts were substantially lower than starts as a whole with new residential construction in the 5-units-or-more category picking up the slack. SFR construction was down 0.2 percent from May but larger projects jumped up 12.9 percent from the earlier month.