Signs Auckland's residential building slump may be over as new housing completions start to rise

The number of new homes completed in Auckland jumped in July.

Auckland Council issued 1565 Code Compliance Certificates (CCCs) for new dwellings in July. That was up 44% compared to June and was the highest number of dwelling completions in the region in any month over the last two years.

CCCs are issued when a building is completed and so are the best indicator of actual new housing supply, while building consents are usually issued before construction starts, so are an indication of potential future supply.

Construction of new homes in Auckland has been in a steady decline since it peaked at just under 2000 a month in late 2023. The latest jump in CCCs may signal the slump is drawing to a close and the supply of new homes is picking up again.

However, the monthly figures need to be treated with caution, because they may be inflated by the completion of a single large multi-unit complex in a particular month, with numbers then dropping back the following month.

On average it takes around two years from the time a consent is issued for a new residential building until it is completed and a CCC is issued.

Altogether 81% of the new residential buildings completed in July received their CCC within two years of being issued with a building consent.

Over the six months to July this year, an average of 1173 new Auckland dwellings were issued with a CCC. Over the same period two years previously, the six months to July 2024, an average of 1181 new dwellings a month were consented in Auckland, according to Statistics NZ. So the two sets of figures do follow each other very closely with a two year gap.

Looking at the building consent figures for the second half of 2024, suggests that new dwelling completions in Auckland should settle at around 1250 a month over the next few months, which would be an increase of around 8% compared to where they have been over the last few months.

So there might be cause for cautious optimism that Auckland's residential building slump has passed the bottom and the supply of new homes in the region is once again on the up.