NSW Home Approvals Still Strong

The Australian Bureau of Statistics for October show that New South Wales home approvals are still strong but have been dipping over the last two months, says the Urban Taskforce.

"NSW home approvals have dropped slightly from an all-time high of 5,572 approvals in July based on a trend to 5,168 in October," says Urban Taskforce CEO Chris Johnson.

"Anything over 5,000 approvals a month is very good news for NSW housing supply but the dip from the July high is a worry if this trend continues.

"The main drop in approvals has been in the apartment sector where approvals dropped from 3,322 in July to 3,032 in October. There does seem to be a cooling off in apartments driven partly by the banks tightening their lending policies and partly through the difficulty of getting approvals through councils.

"In the non-residential sector NSW approvals are leading the country by value compared to a continuing drop in Victoria over the last two years.

"In the seven years since the Global Financial Crisis at the end of 2008 NSW home approvals have steadily climbed up from being below 2,000 to now being over 5,000.

"While these are dramatic improvements not all approvals translate to commencements and more work is required to find out why many housing approvals don't lead to actual construction. A significant part of the loss from approvals to commencements is caused by lengthy negotiations with government agencies and local governments on conditions to an approval."

See below graph based on ABS figures: