Latest news with #DanielRossi
News.com.au
30-05-2025
- Business
- News.com.au
New housing approvals slip dangerously far behind National Housing Accord
Australia's housing shortage has taken another turn, with new data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showing a sharp decline in overall dwelling approvals. The drop has been fuelled largely by a collapse in apartment construction, raising fresh concerns for young Australians already locked out of the housing market. The 'Australian dream' of a quarter-acre block was dashed for millions of Aussies long ago, but now it appears even the smallest of apartments are quickly falling off the table as well. For those born after 1990, who weren't gifted a trust fund, house deposit, or struck it big with a wild crypto gamble, the following figures will come as tough reading. The ABS figures, released on Thursday, revealed the total number of dwellings approved in April fell by 5.7 per cent to 14,633. The drop was driven primarily by a 19 per cent fall in approvals for private sector homes excluding standalone houses, which include apartments and townhouses. 'A drop in apartment approvals drove a 19.0 per cent fall in private dwellings excluding houses,' said Daniel Rossi, ABS Head of Construction Statistics. 'Meanwhile, private sector house approvals were up 3.1 per cent.' The collapse in higher-density approvals comes as Australia's population continues to surge, exacerbating what economists, social researchers and rental advocates have long warned is an unsustainable imbalance between supply and demand. According to CoreLogic, the national median dwelling value has increased more than 30 per cent since the start of the pandemic, while rental vacancies remain near historic lows. But new homes, particularly more affordable and urban apartments best suited for first homebuyers, aren't being built at a rate that reflects demand. The situation leaves younger Australians, who already face stagnant wages, high interest rates and record living costs throughout their working life, in an increasingly untenable position. Even April's modest rise in private sector house approvals, driven by 7.3 per cent increases in both New South Wales and Queensland, is unlikely to shift the dial. At 9,349 approvals, the result represents a 4.6 per cent year-on-year increase but does little to compensate for the decline in apartment projects. 'New South Wales had over 2,000 private sector houses approved for the first time since December 2023,' Rossi said, suggesting demand remains high in key states. However, critics argue that standalone homes are becoming increasingly unaffordable or geographically inaccessible for most first-time buyers, especially in capital cities. 'A key driver of recent movements has been the increased value of non-residential projects rather than the number,' Rossi explained. The numbers land amid calls for bold federal and state intervention to fast-track housing construction and cut red tape for medium- and high-density developments — reforms that housing experts argue are long overdue. 'Data confirms the federal government's failure on housing, as new housing approvals slip further behind National Housing Accord targets. The Accord has failed to deliver the level of new houses promised for the tenth consecutive month,' said Morgan Begg, Director of Research at the Institute of Public Affairs. 'Over the first ten months of the federal government's Accord, housing approvals have failed to hit a single target and are now 27 per cent behind where they were promised to be,' Mr Begg said. 'With housing approvals so low, Australia is being set up for a disaster, as in the last three years to June 2025, net migration is on track to be 1.3 million, meaning the gap between demand and supply is drifting further apart. 'Today's new figures reinforce the depth of Australia's housing crisis, brought about by out-of-control migration, a construction sector burdened by red tape, and competition for resources from large, expensive, and inefficient taxpayer-funded construction projects.' But it gets even worse. The IPA claims the time it takes to build a house, from approval to completion, has increased by a whopping 50 per cent over the last 10 years. It has shifted from an average of just over eight months in 2014 to almost 13 months by 2024. 'The federal government clearly does not understand Australia's housing market. It has overestimated the capacity to build new homes, while it has continually underestimated its migration intake forecasts,' Mr Begg said. 'It has created the perfect storm of rising prices and rents in the housing market that has put the great Australian dream of homeownership out of reach.'
Yahoo
06-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Home approvals rise as Australia's economy turns corner
A surge in apartment approvals in NSW has lifted new dwelling consents to the highest level in more than two years, amid a broader recovery in private sector investment. Australia-wide, 16,579 dwellings were approved in January, up 6.3 per cent on the month prior, the Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed. That's still well below the 20,000 dwellings needed on average each month to meet the government's target of 1.2 million new homes by mid-2029. And that doesn't factor in a drop-out rate of about 1-2 per cent of homes that gain approval but don't end up being constructed due to feasibility or other issues. But Thursday's update confirms the trend is certainly heading in the right direction, up 30 per cent from the low of 12,836 dwellings approved in April 2023. January's bounce was driven by a 12.7 per cent rise in private attached dwellings, like apartments and townhouses, said ABS head of construction statistics Daniel Rossi. NSW led the way, with an increase in state significant developments and policies like height bonuses for affordable housing and train station re-zonings potentially contributing to the rise in apartments coming through the pipeline, Oxford Economics' Michael Dyer told AAP. But it was still too early to tell, given apartment approvals tend to be pretty lumpy, he said. "We expect further modest improvement over 2025," Mr Dyer said. "Cash rate cuts are now in play. This is set to aid the release of pent-up housing demand, supporting a more meaningful double-digit recovery from 2026." Policies encouraging supply will be increasingly felt in future years, although utility connection bottlenecks and labour shortages will continue to put a brake on the delivery of new homes, he added. While it was pleasing to see approvals for apartments and townhouses reaching their highest levels since December 2022, they were still too low, said Property Council executive Matthew Kandelaars. "We are approving thousands of fewer apartments now than a decade ago," he said. "Regulations, opportunistic taxes and low productivity are hurting our ability to build the homes Australians need." It comes after national accounts figures released on Wednesday showed private investment in dwellings fell 0.4 per cent in the December quarter. But private investment more broadly rose 0.3 per cent after underperforming in recent months, as electricity projects and mining investments picked up. Household consumption also strengthened amid a return to growth in real household incomes following a record seven quarters of declining GDP per capita. Treasurer Jim Chalmers said the figures showed Australia's economy had turned a corner. "One of the most encouraging elements of that is we're starting to see the private sector reclaim its rightful place as the primary driver of growth in our economy," he told reporters. "Growth in our economy is rebounding strongly, it's rebounding broadly. We saw that in consumption, we saw that in business investment, we see that in the private sector more broadly, and this is a really important thing." Australia's trade balance also recorded an improvement in January, up $696 million as exports rose 1.3 per cent, largely driven by growth in shipments of non-monetary gold to the US.
