NZ: Sand, new dwellings, apartments and retirement!
In the construction industry, the Canterbury rebuild and Auckland’s housing shortage have been dominating media stories for some time. Much is made of Stats NZ’s monthly building consent figures. Building Consents statistics are used in both the public and private sectors as a leading indicator of the general level of residential development, economic activity, employment and investment.
As an aside – one of my local government clients recently suggested that sand sales were a more accurate indicator of building activity than consents. She maintained that between the consent and build there is often a lag, whereas sand purchases (for concrete) and build starts were contemporaneous.
From sand to the discussion at hand though – I was interested in the trends contributing to the rising new build figures, particularly with New Zealand’s ageing population in mind. The following two charts track building consents for new dwellings back to April 2011, when building consent figures and the overall new-build trends were at the lowest ebb in the 30-year history of collecting the data.
Looking at the number of apartments in the total build figure (see chart 1 below), you can see that apartment numbers fluctuate from month to month (figures for new apartments are compiled from consents that have 10 or more attached new dwellings). Indeed Stats New Zealand attribute the volatility of the new dwelling figures to the changeable apartment count.
Fig. 1. The contribution of apartments to the overall new dwelling monthly counts.
Source: Statistics New Zealand
Digging down into the apartment classification, Stats New Zealand also gather information on the retirement (or assisted care) apartments that contribute to the new apartment numbers. The following chart makes interesting reading. Bearing in mind that the retirement village units is only where there were 10 or more units on the consent, it is clear that a significant proportion of new apartment dwelling counts are for our aged. It will be interesting to watch the shift in figures over the next decade.
Fig. 2. The contribution of retirement apartments to the overall new apartment monthly count.
Source: Statistics New Zealand
Find out more out the populations and demographics of New Zealand and Australia via our online demographic resource centre!
Penny - Population expert
Based in New Zealand, Penny primarily looks after our Kiwi clients but also lends her expertise to the Australian context. Penny has extensive experience as a Communication Manager in Local Government and has a degree in Business and Communications. She also brings a breadth of generalist management experience in fields as varied as research, civil defence, project and event management, marketing and training. Penny’s knowledge combined with the .id tools help clients work with their communities to empower grass roots decision-making, advocacy and grant applications, and focus on strengthening council-community relationships. Penny has a rural property and enjoys growing and eating food and wine, which she runs, walks, bikes or swims off, when she’s not in the art studio.
