F2M Market Watch

Housing starts rose a startling 15  percent in September, up from August's revised (upwardly) 758,000 units to 872,000 units. This is 34.8 percent above September 2011's 647,000. Single family starts climbed 11 percent to 543,000.

The housing permits statistic points to the potential for these strong housing start numbers to continue. Permitting authorities issued 894,000 permits in September, 11.6 percent above the August rate of 801,000. This is 45.1 percent above September 2011's 616,000.

These statistics, reported jointly by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the U.S. Census Bureau, beat analyst expectations by wide margins.

We'll report further on this story in our regular Housing Market Update once all the September statistics are in.