--US August housing starts -6.9% to 1.527-mln-unit rate
--US August housing permits -0.7% to 1.560 mln
--US July housing starts revised to +0.4% from +2.8%
--US July starts rate revised to 1.641 mln from 1.672 mln
--US Aug single-family starts -2.4%; July revised to -1.1% from +1.5%

Washington, Sept. 20 (BridgeNews) - Ground-breaking on new homes in August fell 6.9%, the Commerce Department reported Thursday. Starts were reported at the seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.527 million units and building permits, an indicator of future housing activity, fell 0.7% to an annual rate of 1.560 million.

July's starts were revised 1.641 million, and permits were revised to 1.571 million for the prior month.

SINGLE- AND MULTI-FAMILY STARTS:
--Single-family housing starts were down 2.4% to a rate of 1.247 million units.
--Multi-family starts, which often swing sharply from month to month, fell 22.7% to 252,000 units.

REGIONAL ACTIVITY:
--The South region of the country, where starts fell 14.0%, led August new housing activity. Housing starts in the Northeast fell 7.7%, in the West fell 3.7%, but starts rose 6.6% in the Midwest.

DETAILS:
--In August, not seasonally adjusted starts totaled 138,300 units, down 2.2% from a year ago.
--Building permits totaled 147,300 in August on an unadjusted basis, up 0.3% from a year ago.
--For the year so far, starts totaled 1.117 million up 2.5% from the comparable 2000 period.