The building industry shows no sign of slowing down but the latest building consent figures suggest the residential construction market has peaked.
There were 4547 new dwellings consented in August, barely changed (+0.9%) from the 4508 consented in August last year.
That took the total number of new dwellings consented to 50,653 for the 12 months to the end of August, up 8.9% for the previous 12 months.
Stand-alone houses remain the most popular type of new dwelling, with 23,060 consented in the year to August, although their numbers are declining and were down 8.9% compared to the previous 12 months.
Townhouses and home units remain the second most popular option with 20,681 consented in the year to August with their numbers growing spectacularly, up 41.7% compared to the previous 12 months.
Growth in new apartments appears to be taking a breather, with 4096 being consented in the 12 months to August, almost unchanged from 4094 in the previous 12 months.
There were also 2816 retirement village units consented in the 12 months to August, up 11.5% on a year earlier.
However while the number of new dwellings being consented may have flattened, it appears costs have not.
Although the total number of new dwelling consents issued in August was up just 0.9% on August last year, the total value of those consents was up 12.9% at $1.912 billion for the month. (A more detailed quarterly breakdown of consents including average value and average value per square metre, by dwelling type and region, is available on our Residential Building Consent Analysis page).
On top of that another $249 million of residential alteration work was consented in August, up 26.7% on August last year.
That took the total value of residential building work consented in August to $2.161 billion, up 14.3% on a year earlier.
In the 12 months to August, $22.856 billion of residential building work was consented, up 16.1% on the previous 12 months.
While those figures suggest a strong pipeline of new work for residential construction, the outlook for the non-residential building industry appears even more robust.
The total value of non-residential building work, which includes commercial buildings such as shops, offices and factories, as well as non-commercial buildings such as schools and hospitals, was just $2 million shy of $1 billion in August, up 22.3% compared to August last year.
In the 12 months to August, non-residential building work consented was worth $9.167 billion, up 14.3% on the previous 12 months. (A more detailed quarterly breakdown of consents issued for the main commercial building types including average floor area and average value per square metre, is available on our Commercial Building Consent Analyisis page).
That took the total value of all building work consented in the 12 months to August to $32.023 billion, up 15.6% on the previous 12 months.
The comment stream on this story is now closed.
Building consents - type
Select chart tabs
Building consents - residential
Select chart tabs
- You can have articles like this delivered directly to your inbox via our free Property Newsletter. We send it out 3-5 times a week with all of our property-related news, including auction results, interest rate movements and market commentary and analysis. To start receiving them, register here (it's free) and when approved you can select any of our free email newsletters.
19 Comments
Bit more critical thinking required, Greg.
For example how do these stats marry with yesterday’s atrocious results in the ANZ survey, in terms of confidence in the residential construction sector?
The wider population frequently acts the opposite of what "those in the know" are proclaiming.
You cant build anything without a consent, we all probably know a certain percentage won't break ground anytime soon due to the lag between wanting to get something permitted and the realities of actually building something.
If I could summarise what's coming across the quotes desk at the moment, housing has definitely dropped away (although in fairness it's also not on my radar so much), government spending is ramping a bit, and commercial is holding steady.
This data is for August. As I have said before many of these consents would have been lodged early in the year when sentiment was quite a lot better.
Given all the work and cost to get a consent, and it’s a sunken cost, even as things deteriorated from June/July many developers would just be keen to get their building consents and their development rights.
How utterly rude
What a prick
Why? I come to this website for critical analysis, not just telling me the stats which I can get myself. This website published a story yesterday about the atrocious level of confidence in the residential construction sector. Good journalism and analysis would mention that in this analysis, as this data is lagging and the ANZ survey is very current. The survey moderates the distortion presented by this data.
I need better analysis if I am to support this website financially. Too often it falls on the readers / commenters to do the analysis.
What is rude is calling someone a name, just like you have done.
Not every article is critical analysis, maybe not everyone wants to go fishing for the latest stats.
Pretty common to see articles that contravene other recent articles. Maybe that's called balance.
Nope.
It’s poor journalism.
Good, balanced journalism would refer to yesterday’s ANZ survey.
I guess you could always offer your standards of excellence and sage advice to interest.co. They probably would leap at the chance of on-boarding the former ESL teacher now transformed into a self confessed top rating economist. Who knows.
Have a nice evening, and watch out for your problem drinking down there in Dullsville.
Says the man who lives in a terrace
Just had a look at this website’s‘Resident Building Consents Analysis’ page.
Those per square metre $ values from Stats NZ are a crock. For townhouses, no way they are circa $2600. More like $3500-4000
I have real data and $2600 would have been the price as of last year and maybe even very early this year. Now, through a third party, the prices (if apples with apples) would be +$3200 - rental standard nothing too flash and limited landscaping etc.
Another two years or so, the picture might be clearer.
For a glimpse of what is upon us have a chat with your local car dealer - one who deals in Utes.
Can't move them.
And utes were the biggest seller last year!!! Toys are being sold now too...
Hutt Valley Market 26th Sept
First home buyers returning to the market - are new homes part of the reason
Lots of talk this week in the media about first home buyers returning to the market.
Starting to see this within the Hutt Valley along with the upper quartile buyers abandoning the market with just 9 houses over $1 million selling in the last 2 months compared to 26 houses selling for under 800 000.
A key factor would be the reduction in prices - a quarter of the houses listed in the hutt valley are under 700K - but also a big factor would be the reduction in competition for the bottom quartile with investors transferring to new houses to take advantage of the tax benefits offered with a new build versus the existing build.
Unfortunately I dont track sales of new builds but judging by the number of new build listings with just this week 6 of the weeks 25 listings are for either newly built or off the plan listings (approx 20%) there is an ongoing demand for this segment of the market.
Which is good news for first home buyers and renters as the more properties available the lower house prices and rents will be
Current Market Listings
505 houses on the market- Down 15 on last week .
Average number of houses sold each week 25. This data has now been consistent since March with between 90 and 100 houses selling per month according to the REINZ data
505 houses on the market with 25 a week selling means there is 20.0 weeks stock on the market.
House Price Reductions
254 houses have a listed price
65% of the houses listed with a price have reduced their price since listing
The average markdown has increased this week from 106K to $107K.
Of those that have listed prices (pool 254) 49 have reduced their prices by 100K
16 have reduced their prices by over 200K, 6 have reduced their prices by 300K and 1 has reduced their price by 400K and 1 has reduced their price by a massive $595K.
The Median house price for all 505 listings is down from $779K to $775K this week
Market Valuations
The latest QV valuations (valuations by QV which are updated every month and give an approximation of a houses value) have now dropped $250K since Jan for the Hutt.
The latest QV valuations will be used this month to calculate the new RV’s for Lower Hutt. These will be released in Nov.
Homes is showing prices dropped roughly 2.5% in August alone – with most suburbs recording a drop of 25-35K for the month.
The latest round of homes updates came through last week show the following
- Woburn (the hutts most expensive suburb) – average house price is down 310K from $1.66M (in Feb 22) to $1.35M, this is a 6% drop YOY and was a 35K drop from Aug
- Petone is down $220K from $1.19M in Feb to $970K This is a 13% drop YOY and a 25K drop from Aug
- Wainuiomata (the huts cheapest suburb and attractive to investors and FHB’s) is down $175K from $870K in Feb to $695K. this is a 13% drop YOY and a 25K drop from Aug.
Houses sold vs houses removed
My records show 326 houses listed with a Price have sold YTD
I have records of a further 286 houses that have been removed from the market unsold YTD.
30 of those houses removed from the market have been listed on the rental market.
Length of time on the Market
- 375 houses have been on the market for over 30 days - 74% (last week it was 390)
- 274 houses have been on the market for over 60 days - 54% (last week it was 302)
- 218 houses have been on the market for over 90 days – 43% (last week was 237)
- 178 houses have been on the market for over 120 days - 35% (last week was 158)
- 110 of the houses have been on the market for over 150 days - 22%
- 65 of the houses have been on the market for over 180 days (6 months) – 13%
- 24 of the properties have been on the market since 2021 – 4.6%
Rental Market
This week the rental market has 206 properties for rent (up 7 on last week) up 93 on this time last year, – when 113 houses were for rent. This is the highest number of rentals on the market since July.
The percentage of properties listed at $650 is at 38%. This is the 10th week in a row where the percentage of rentals over $650 has been less than 40%.
Median Rental price for the Hutt valley is $600 a week (this is slightly up from the previous $595 a week midpoint)
Of interest to me is those houses that have been on the market > 150days. My own interpretation of this is that the owners don't really want sell unless they achieve their asking price. It will sell if you are prepared to meet the sellers price. If they really wanted to sell it would fall in under a 90 day sale.
People where so sure it'd cliff edge due to rates. Life goes on despite inflation and supply chains.
Just because something is consented, doesnt mean its going to be built. Developers now need to try and sell them off the plan and get finance before being able to break ground. Seeing quite a few sections with consents and house plans returning to the market at the moment.
We welcome your comments below. If you are not already registered, please register to comment.
Remember we welcome robust, respectful and insightful debate. We don't welcome abusive or defamatory comments and will de-register those repeatedly making such comments. Our current comment policy is here.