Builders kept busy in the city
The value of building consents in New Plymouth reached $253.8 million in the year to September, according to the latest figures from Statistics NZ.
That figure is down on last year, when the total value was $260.4m, but up on 2017, when it was $230.2m.
Campbell Mattson, owner of Location Homes and president of the Master Builders Association
Taranaki branch, said that at the current rate the number of residential building consents for new homes in New Plymouth would likely get close to the 453 granted in 2017, which was one of the highest figures ever after the dip to 245 in 2018.
‘‘This year, as of the end of October, we are sitting about 380 [homes],’’ Mattson said. ‘‘Overall it is certainly a busy time.’’
It was currently hard to find a sub-trader – such as a plumber, painter or ‘‘brickie’’ – who was not busy, he said. His company had seven flooring jobs to complete in the space of two weeks.
Mattson said the consents included more medium-density housing and multi-unit consents for one site.
The total building consents for the year to October is 1340, which does not include the $300m wing on Taranaki Base Hospital and the $150m Summerset retirement village in Bell Block.
Last year, 1593 consents were lodged with New Plymouth District Council.
Meanwhile, a council report showed there were 775 consent applications in the JulySeptember
quarter, including for matters such as code compliance for electricity.
Of these, 65 were not dealt with on time due to high growth and staff shortages.
Council chief operating officer Kelvin Wright said the council processed about 165 consents per month, most of which were approved. ‘‘Our district is growing quickly ... Unfortunately we had staff members leave at the same time as this increase in building. We have been working to fill these positions since early this year and now we have, we expect to get back on track.’’
In the rest of Taranaki, building consents were valued at $15.8m in the Stratford district this year, down from $26.7m last year; and in South Taranaki the figure was $51.3m, up from $47.5m.
But the level of building consents, both at regional and district level, remained healthy, with sustained growth in residential construction activity across all three districts, Justine Gilliland, chief executive of regional economic development agency Venture Taranaki, said.