ABS has released new dwelling approval data which showed a 48.8% lift in the number of dwellings approved in NSW during the month of February over the previous month.
Approvals for houses rose 27.2%, while new apartment approvals increased by 78.1% compared to the previous month. But while these figures show “a tremendous improvement, it comes from a historic low,” said Tom Forrest, CEO of Urban Taskforce.
“The latest upswing also improves the annual result,” Forrest said. “When you look at the performance of the planning system over the two years, which were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, in the last 12 months, there were 21.77% more dwellings approved in NSW compared to the previous year (private sector). Specifically, there were 31.51% more approvals for apartments and 13.45% more for houses.”
Forrest said that “a lot of work needs to be done to elevate the approvals numbers to the pre-pandemic period.”
“In the three years prior to the start of the pandemic, the average number for annual dwelling approvals was 70,000,” he said. “The latest pleasing results brings NSW annual approvals (for all homes) to 62,000. We need to get that number up to about 80,000 per year across all of NSW to address the current shortages in supply.”
