Home Approvals All But Steady Across April

Home approvals remained all but steady over April after a rise in March.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), approvals fell just 0.3 per cent last month after a 2.7 per cent rise the previous month.

ABS head of construction statistics Daniel Rossi said approvals for private houses fell 1.6 per cent across April.

“Approvals for private sector homes excluding houses also fell, by 1.1 per cent, in April in seasonally adjusted terms,” Rossi said.

Total home approvals declined in Tasmania (-16.1 per cent), New South Wales (-4.5 per cent) and Western Australia (-0.9 per cent).

Rises were recorded in South Australia (13.9 per cent) and Queensland (5 per cent), while Victoria was flat.

Meanwhile, approvals for private sector houses decreased in NSW (-5 per cent), Victoria (-2 per cent), Queensland (-0.2 per cent), and South Australia (-0.1 per cent), but rose in Western Australia (3.5 per cent).

The value of total buildings approved fell 3.8 per cent after a 13.8 per cent rise in March. The value of total residential buildings fell 3.2 per cent with a 3.8 per cent drop in new residential buildings and a 0.4 per cent rise in alterations and additions.

▲ Going down: home approvals dropped 16.1 per cent in Tasmania.

The value of non-residential buildings approved fell 4.6 per cent, after a 21.7 per cent March rise.

Oxford Economics Australia senior economist Maree Kilroy said the Australian market was at or near the bottom of the cycle “although no major shift is expected from the current activity base through 2024”.

“Momentum is set to gain in 2025 with the pass-through of interest rate cuts and policy support at federal and state government levels.”

Total home approvals were running at 163,518 annualised (original terms), well below the pace needed to meet the Federal Government’s 1.2 million home target, Kilroy said.

“The state-by-state rollout of the National Construction Code 2022 may provide some temporary upside in coming months, with a push to beat the implementation of these higher build standards in Queensland and Victoria.”

Master Builders Australia chief economist Shane Garrett said the data showed a concerning trend which, if it were to continue, “would see us fall well short of the National Housing Accord target”.

“The new National Housing Accord kicks off in less than five weeks and envisages 240,000 new homes each year. However, the past 12 months have seen less than 163,500 new home building approvals across Australia.

“Just 60,600 higher density homes were approved over the year to April. This is the lowest total for any 12-month period since September 2012 almost 12 years ago.

“The challenge is massive, not impossible, but requires a 47 per cent increase in the volume of new home building output.”