ABS, HIA: Victoria has already missed 2024 new home target as housing approvals plunge – Beragampengetahuan

New housing approvals have fallen nationwide, and Victorian construction industry insiders already believe it’s too late for the state to reach government targets.

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Victoria has already missed its 2024 home building targets just days into the new year.

New building approvals data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics yesterday shows the number of new houses given the nod for construction fell 2.3 per cent in November.

With the decline adding to a year of plunging figures, Housing Industry Association Victorian executive director Keith Ryan said we were now approving fewer houses than before the pandemic, and apartment and townhouse construction was not going to make up the difference in the foreseeable future.

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“We are not going to get 80,000 built this year (Victorian government) and I suspect the federal target (about 56,000 homes a year) is also out,” Mr Ryan said.

“We are now looking at a historically low level, it’s now below pre-Covid levels.”

To reach the federal government’s 1.2 million homes in five years target, the nation needs to build 240,000 every 12 months until 2029. The Victorian government has outlined plans to build 800,000 new homes across the state in the next decade.

He added that with new house approvals down 7.2 per cent for the year in 2023, interest rate increases had certainly dented consumer confidence.

But that might be good news for mortgage holders. The average cost to build a Victorian house appears to have stabilised, notable given the cost of home construction is one of the key factors assessed by the Reserve Bank in determining inflation.

Housing construction material and trade costs are key factors used to assess inflation for Australia by the Reserve Bank.

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While in 2022 the average cost of an approved house build rose almost every month, the figure fluctuated last year and after rising as high as $489,000 in July it was just $477,600 in November.

Mr Ryan said the plateau in costs could be caused by material costs and trades wages flattening out, or by consumers accepting smaller budgets and choosing to build more modest homes than they would have a year ago.

“We know that those who once might have gone for a more up-market product are going back to basic builds,” he said.

Master Builders Australia chief economist Shane Garrett said with national house-building approvals also falling in November, Australia was expected to build 170,100 new homes in the 2023-2024 financial year.

An increase in high-density approvals for apartments and units added a positive sign for approvals, but the industry group warned it would not fill the gap from housing approval shortfalls.

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