Building consent trend still rising

New residential dwelling consents were down by 4.9% in August 2015 but this comes in the midst of an increasing trend, according to Statistics New Zealand.

Wednesday, September 30th 2015, 12:00AM

by Miriam Bell

While the latest data showed a seasonally adjusted dip in consents in August, this followed a 20% increase in July 2015.

Statistics New Zealand business indicators senior manager Neil Kelly said the August figure was still up 11% from August 2014.

“The national trend is increasing, with the trend for the number of new dwellings consented at its highest level since July 2004.”

Eleven of the country’s 16 regions consented more new dwellings in August 2015 as compared to August 2014.

In good news for those concerned about Auckland’s supply issues, the SuperCity’s consent trend continues to rise.

Kelly said the trend for the number of new dwellings consented in Auckland is at its highest level since November 2004.

This is partly due to the fact that a large number of apartments were consented in July 2015.

Westpac industry economist David Norman said the fall in consents in August was expected and was largely the result of the spike in consents in July.

He also said that multi-unit consents, which are mostly apartments and townhouses, can be lumpy from month to month, and that makes it difficult to read too much into monthly changes.

“However, the decline in the number of residential consents in August was not as pronounced as expected, meaning the trend upward is stronger than originally thought.

“Given the shift to multi-unit buildings in Auckland, we can expect to see more of these monthly fluctuations as large new developments are consented or not.”

In Norman’s view, the data shows the trend is that residential building consents are on the rise, with year-on-year growth of 8% nationally.

“Much of the growth is expected to be in Auckland, with Canterbury consent numbers flattening as the residential component of the rebuild begins to taper off.

"We expect seasonally-adjusted quarterly numbers and year-on-year numbers to continue to show growth for some time.”

In fact, in trend terms, residential consents were up for the sixth month in a row, he added.

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