U.S. September auto sales rate highest since Feb 2008: Autodata

U.S. auto sales hit their highest monthly level since February 2008, at 14.96 million new vehicles sold on a seasonally adjusted annualized basis, consultant Autodata Corp said on Tuesday.

Autodata said September sales rose 13 percent to 1,190,289 new vehicles.

The September annualized sales rate tops 14.52 million from August, the previous monthly high for this year. In 2011, U.S. auto sales were 12.8 million new vehicles.

(Reporting by Bernie Woodall; Editing by Gary Hill)