Residential building consents rose 6.6% in April

Residential building consents climbed 6.6% in April as new housing intentions climbed at their fastest monthly pace in eight years.

Seasonally adjusted consents rose to 2390 in April from 2,242 a month earlier, Statistics NZ said. For houses alone, permits jumped 15% to 1913, the biggest monthly gain since April 2008. On an unadjusted basis, new housing consents were up 28% to 1742 in April from the same month a year earlier, and up 12% on an annual basis to 20,098, the most for an April year since 2007.

Permits for all dwelling types rose an unadjusted 12% to 2361 in April from a year earlier, for a 12% annual increase to 28,038, an 11-year high. Statistics NZ said the slower pace of increase across all dwelling types was due to a slump in the number of apartments consented, especially in Auckland.

"Apartment numbers tend to be quite volatile," Statistics NZ business indicators manager Nick Kelly said in a statement. "For stand-alone houses, the trend is still increasing."

New Zealand is going through a housing boom as authorities look to make up for a shortage of supply which was driven by underinvestment when property financiers fell over through the latter half of last decade and has been compounded by record inflows of net migration.

Auckland has the biggest housing shortfall, and new building permits dropped to 699 in April from 912 a year earlier, though the value of those consents rose to $267 million from $240 million.

Today's figures show the value of non-residential building permits rose 9.4% to $459 million in April from the same month a year earlier, and was up 11% to $5.85 billion on an annual basis. Across all buildings, the value was up 20% to $1.41 billion in April and 14% in the year to $17.08 billion.

(BusinessDesk)

Paul McBeth
Tue, 31 May 2016

Categories

Analysis

Featured

Residential building consents rose 6.6% in April