Building Approvals, Australia

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Provides the number of dwelling units and value of buildings approved

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Reference period
October 2021
Released
30/11/2021
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Key statistics

  • The seasonally adjusted estimate for total dwellings approved fell 12.9% in October.
  • Private sector houses rose 4.3%, while private sector dwellings excluding houses fell 37.5%. 
  • The value of non-residential building approved fell 20.9%. 

Dwellings approved

October key figures, seasonally adjusted
 Oct-21Monthly changeYearly change
 no.%%
Total dwelling units approved15,911-12.9-8.1
Private sector houses10,7994.3-3.7
Private sector dwellings excluding houses4,821-37.5-16.5

The number of dwellings approved in Australia fell 12.9% in October, in seasonally adjusted terms. This follows a 3.9% decline in September.

Private sector house approvals rose 4.3% in October, to 10,799, following a 14.8% fall in September. Private sector dwellings excluding houses fell 37.5%, driven by a large fall in apartment approvals in October.

Dwellings approved, states and territories, seasonally adjusted
 Private sector housesPrivate sector housesTotal dwelling unit approvalsTotal dwelling unit approvals
no.Monthly % changeno.Monthly % change
New South Wales23930.74327-29.4
Victoria36216.45374-2.0
Queensland21183.330382.2
South Australia856-3.3992-8.1
Western Australia145116.31575-2.7
Tasmanianana213-1.8
Northern Territorynananana
Australian Capital Territorynananana
Australia107994.315911-12.9

 

By state, the number of dwelling approvals fell in New South Wales (-29.4%), South Australia (-8.1%), Western Australia (-2.7%), Victoria (-2.0%) and Tasmania (-1.8%). Queensland rose (2.2%), in seasonally adjusted terms.

Approvals for private sector houses rose in Western Australia (16.3%), Victoria (6.4%), Queensland (3.3%) and New South Wales (0.7%). South Australia fell (-3.3%),  in seasonally adjusted terms.

Value of building approved

Value of building approved, by building type, seasonally adjusted
 $mMonthly % change
New residential building5479.3-13.5
Alterations and additions to residential building963.32.6
Total residential building6442.5-11.4
Non-residential building3669.5-20.9
Total building10112.1-15.1

 

The value of total building approved fell 15.1% in October, in seasonally adjusted terms. The value of non-residential building fell 20.9%, having fallen 10.4% in September.

The value of total residential building fell 11.4%, comprising a 13.5% decrease in new residential building, and a 2.6% rise in alterations and additions.

Interactive map

To view the interactive map, click here.

Note that the interactive map will be offline soon after this publication release and will be refreshed with the current month's data within 24 hours.

How to use

Data downloads

We will be progressively transitioning to releasing Excel files in .XLSX format from 3rd December 2021.

Download all (8.58 MB)

Time series spreadsheets

Data files

Datacubes

Series ID concordance

Data files
Download xlsx [177.33 KB]

Private residential alterations and additions, July 2016 - October 2021 - States and Territories

Data files
Download xlsx [59.37 KB]
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Small area datacubes

Data files

I-note

ABS.Stat datasets

Caution: Data in ABS.Stat is currently released after the 11:30am release on the ABS website. Please check the time period when using ABS.Stat.

Help for: ABS.Stat Datasets

Building Approvals by Greater Capital Cities Statistical Area (GCCSA) and above - Number and value of approvals, monthly, July 2001 onwards

Building Approvals by Statistical Area Level 2 (SA2) and above - Number and value of approvals, monthly, July 2011 onwards

Building Approvals by Local Government Area (LGA 2020) - Number and value of approvals, monthly, 2020/21

Building Approvals by Local Government Area (LGA 2021) - Number and value of approvals, monthly, 2021/22

ABS.Stat is updating and the above datasets are now available in 'Data Explorer'. 

The data available in Data Explorer is the same as ABS.Stat but with a new interface and added functionality.

For more information about Data Explorer and to see what's changed, see the Data Explorer user guide.
The current version of ABS.Stat will be removed at the end of 2021.

Data Explorer datasets

Caution: Data in the Data Explorer is currently released after the 11:30am release on the ABS website. Please check the time period when using Data Explorer.

Building Approvals by Greater Capital Cities Statistical Area (GCCSA) and above - Number and value of approvals, monthly, July 2001 onwards

Building Approvals by Statistical Area Level 2 (SA2) and above - Number and value of approvals, monthly, July 2011 onwards

Building Approvals by Local Government Area (LGA 2020) - Number and value of approvals, monthly, 2020/21

Building Approvals by Local Government Area (LGA 2021) - Number and value of approvals, monthly, 2021/22

GeoPackages

Data files

Data notes

This publication provides the number of dwelling units and value of buildings approved released in Building Approvals, Australia on 30 November 2021.

Small area data cubes and CSV files will be made available in an “Additional Information” release five business days after the main publication. These will be for Statistical Areas Level 2 and Local Government Areas. Release dates are published under the “Forthcoming Issues” section of the publication and in the ABS Release Calendar.

A number of time series spreadsheets contain ‘np’ (not available for publication) annotations. This is due to confidential data being contained in these series.

New base year for chain volume estimates

A new base year, 2019-20, has been introduced into the chain volume estimates which has resulted in revisions to growth rates in subsequent periods. The chain volume estimates have been re-referenced to 2019-20, thereby preserving additivity in the quarters after the reference year. Re-referencing affects the levels of, but not the movements in, chain volume estimates. 

Revisions this month

In this release, revisions are provided for the time period from July 2020 to September 2021. Further information about potential sources of revisions can be found in the feature article released with the January 2016 Building Approvals publication - "Revisions to Building Approval Statistics".

Revisions to the total number of dwelling units approved in this issue are:

 Financial year
Dwellings2020-212021-22
New South Wales4214
Victoria-18-41
Queensland13250
South Australia-32115
Western Australia2381
Tasmania--
Northern Territory--
Australian Capital Territory--
Total-261319

Inquiries

For inquiries about these and related statistics, contact the Customer Assistance Service via the ABS website Contact Us page. The ABS Privacy Policy outlines how the ABS will handle any personal information that you provide to us.

Previous catalogue number

This release previously used catalogue number 8731.0.

Post release changes

07/12/2021 - As advertised in the main release of this publication on 30 November 2021, this additional information release contains the small area Excel datacubes and CSV files for the 2020-21 and 2021-22 financial years. 

Related information

Building Activity, Australia

Construction Work Done, Australia, Preliminary

Construction Activity: Chain Volume Measures, Australia

Functional Classification of Buildings

Lending indicators, Australia

Residential Property Price Indexes: Eight Capital Cities

Producer Price Indexes, Australia

Article archive

Previous feature articles

Methodology

Building Approvals, Australia methodology, October 2021

Media releases