Ministry Of Development: Housing Permits Rose By 39% In 2015

29 January 2016 – Expansión

Permits for the construction of new homes are at a five-year high, but the figures are still tiny compared with their pre-crisis levels.

The number of permits requested for the construction of new homes soared by 39% last year, to around 48,600, according to official data published by the Ministry of Development for the 11 months to November.

In this way, requests for the construction of new homes recorded a second consecutive year of increases and reached a five-year high, not seen since 2011.

Between January and November, requests were made for 44,577 permits to construct homes, which represents an increase of 35% compared to the previous year.

If we assume that this rate of demand was maintained during the last month of the year (around 4,050 per month), then the total would have amounted to around 48,600 permits by year end.

Despite these figures reaching their highest levels for five years, they still fall a long way below the series maximum, recorded in 2006, just before the crisis when the sector was at the height of its boom and 865,561 permits were requested. To put this into context, the number of permits requested during the whole of last year was equivalent to the number requested in just one month in 2006.

During 2015, 69% of all permits requested related to the construction of new blocks of flats, with 33,900 units, representing a YoY increase of 45%.

The other permits requested last year related to single-family residences, with 14,700 requests in total, up by 27% compared with the previous year.

More renovations

Similarly, in 2015, the number of permits requested to renovate or restore homes increased by 14%, to reach 25,668.

By contrast, during the same period, the number of requests for home extensions decreased, albeit more moderately (by 3%), from 1,485 in 2014 to 1,428 in 2015.

Original story: Expansión

Translation: Carmel Drake