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New figures have revealed that Australia experienced a slight increase in building approvals during September following a significant decline in August.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, 18,900 dwellings were approved for construction during September – up 2.2 per cent on the month prior.
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The number of approved private sector houses dropped by 1.9 per cent (9,536), while the number of approved private sector dwellings excluding houses rose 6.1 per cent (9,134).
Looking at the states, Queensland saw the biggest increase in seasonally-adjusted new home building approvals (+41.6 per cent), followed by Tasmania (+31.7 per cent) and Victoria +5.0 per cent), while New South Wales and South Australia saw the biggest declines – down 16.6 per cent and 14.9 per cent respectively.
In trend terms, approvals dropped by 3.5 per cent the Northern Territory and by 0.7 per cent in the ACT.
“Today’s result reaffirms our view that we are seeing the peak in the current cycle, and we expect to see building approval numbers easing back throughout early 2016,” Housing Industry Association economist Geordan Murray said.
“However, there is a very large volume of work in the pipeline that will sustain a very healthy level of actual building activity throughout the upcoming year.”
Mortgage Choice CEO John Flavell said that as supply eventually catches up with demand, the overall level of construction activity will ease significantly.
“There is no denying that supply will eventually catch up with demand – it is just a matter of when. Until that happens however, we will continue to see strong levels of construction activity and growth in property values,” he said.
[Related: New home sales decline]
