Builders broke ground on more homes than forecast in October and construction permits climbed to the highest level since March 2010, signs that housing may become less of a laggard in the third year of the U.S. recovery. Starts decreased 0.3 percent to a 628,000 annual rate from September’s 630,000 pace that was slower than previously reported, Commerce Department figures showed today in Washington. The median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News called for a drop to 610,000. Building permits, a proxy for future construction, increased 10.9 percent. Mortgage rates near a record low and a reduced stock of new properties may benefit builders like D.R. Horton Inc. At the same time, foreclosures are holding down property values as unemployment at 9 percent restrains sales, helping explain why the Federal Reserve and the Obama administration are looking for ways to jumpstart housing. “We’re still at the bottom but gently beginning to move up in the right direction,” said Eric Green, chief market economist at TD Securities Inc. in New York, who projected 625,000 October starts. It may be late 2012 before “we reach the point that housing construction is going to contribute meaningfully to growth,” he said. Fewer Americans than forecast filed first-time claims for unemployment insurance payments last week, an indication the job market may be gaining traction, a Labor Department report showed today.