Detached house approvals up by 0.6% in July: HIA

THE Housing Industry Association has seen detached house approvals rise in July.

“The volume of detached houses approved for construction nationally increased by 0.6 percent in the month of July 2025 ahead of the 5% deposit guarantee announced last week,” HIA senior economist Maurice Tapang said.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) yesterday released its monthly building approvals data for July 2025 for detached houses and multi-units covering all states and territories.

“Strong population growth, tight labour markets and recovering household incomes helped improve confidence in an increasing number of markets over the last 18 months,” Mr Tapang said. 

“This cyclical improvement in new home commencements will be enhanced by supply side initiatives, such as the 5% deposit scheme announced last week. Around a third of all new homes are built by first home buyers, and in the long-term, initiatives that reduce the cost of first home buyers entering the market will lead to an increase in new home commencements.

“This month’s increase in detached house approvals was broad-based across most states and territories, except Queensland and South Australia.

“This month’s increase brought the total volume of detached house approvals in Australia over the past 12 months up by 5.3% to 112,760.

“With three interest rate cuts having been delivered this year, more households are expected to return to the market to purchase a home.

“Strong demand for housing in the established market is expected to continue filtering through to the new home market, as building a new home becomes relatively more appealing,” he said.

“Multi-unit approvals decreased by 18.8% in the month of July 2025. Approvals for this segment remains volatile and at very low levels.

“The correlation between an apartment approval and commencement remains weak, as challenges with access to overseas financing, development costs, labour shortages and planning remain,” Mr Tapang said.

“In order to build sufficient housing to meet existing and growing demand, apartment construction needs to double from current levels.

“There remain upside risks to home building activity in Australia if policymakers help lower the cost of delivering new homes to market,” Mr Tapang said.

The volume of detached house approvals in the month of July 2025 in seasonally adjusted terms increased in Western Australia by 3.6%, followed by New South Wales (+3.2%) and Victoria (+1.7%). South Australia recorded a 4.6% monthly decline in detached house approvals, while Queensland fell by 3.7%. In original terms, Tasmania recorded a 48.4% increase in detached approvals, followed by the Northern Territory (+16.2%) and the Australian Capital Territory (+3.3%).

www.hia.com.au

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