Property consents go through roof

House-building consents continue to smash records, with numbers up 24 per cent in the year to March, to hit a first of 50,858 residential units.

Stats NZ said never before had New Zealand exceeded 50,000 consents issued in a year — and most consents result in new buildings.

Construction and property statistics manager Michael Heslop cited apartment numbers in particular for driving up activity levels. There were 25,475 multi-unit homes consented to March, up 40 per cent annually.

Heslop said the number of standalone houses consented rose 12 per cent to 25,383. “The number of multiunit homes consented has steadily increased over the past decade, but this is the first 12-month period where there have been more multi-unit homes consented than stand-alone houses,” Heslop said.

Multi-unit homes include townhouses, apartments, retirement village units and granny flats.

The 3000 multi-unit homes included 2172 townhouses, flats, and units, 616 apartments; and 212 retirement village units.

Four regions had record numbers of new homes consented in the year: Auckland with 21,477, which was up 23 per cent annually, Wellington with 3836, up 26 per cent, Canterbury with 8557, up 41 per cent, and Otago with 2506 consents, up 34 per cent.