August Housing Starts Plunge 6.2%

New home construction plunged 6.2% in August, the Commerce Department said Wednesday.

The decline to an annual rate of 898,000 units was the lowest since January 1991.

Building permits, an indicator of new construction, fell 8.8% to an annual pace of 854000 units. Construction of single-family homes fell 19%

The drop was bigger than economists’ forecasts of a decline to an annual rate of 950,000 units, Bloomberg reported.