Building Permits

What is Building Permits?

Building Permits is the Australian official Building Approvals collection from the ABS (Australian Bureau of Statistics, the national statistics agency). It is a monthly census (a full count, not a sample) covering approvals from council permits, government contracts and major remote projects. Since July 1990 it covers residential approvals worth 10000 Australian dollars or more and nonresidential approvals worth 50000 Australian dollars or more. It excludes roads, bridges, railways and earthworks, and as a leading economic indicator it does not measure starts, completions or work done.

When is it released and what happens each release?

Approvals granted in a calendar month are published monthly 4 to 5 weeks after the first day of that month. Release is at 1130am Australian Eastern Standard Time on the ABS website, with Data Explorer (searchable database) copies added after that release. Small area (local districts) files follow 5 working days later and chain volume (inflation adjusted) plus demolition files arrive in April July October and January. Revisions reflect late records within 12 to 18 months, and readers watch seasonally adjusted (seasonality removed) and trend (direction) levels and change with no target.

What moves Building Permits?

Moves come from housing types, ownership and building values, with no fixed weights.

• Private sector houses: number of detached houses approved for private ownership, the steadiest part.
• Private sector dwellings excluding houses: number of flats, units, terraces and apartments for private ownership, the volatile part.
• Public sector dwellings: dwellings owned by government at completion, including private built homes bought by housing authorities.
• Residential building value: estimated completed value of new houses, other new homes and alterations and additions (upgrades and conversions, split out since July 1996).
• Nonresidential building value by class: approved value for offices, hotels, retail, factories and schools under the Functional Classification of Buildings.
• Total dwelling units: sum across all homes approved, the headline series watched by readers.

In March 2021, released 12 May 2021, total approvals reached 23176 dwellings, up 17.4% on the month and up 47.4% on the year. Private houses were 14117, up 0.1%, while dwellings excluding houses jumped to 8563, up 63.6%, driving the headline gain. New residential value was 7829.5 million Australian dollars, up 25.4%, alterations were 1072.5 million, up 7.3%, and total residential was 8902.0 million, up 22.9%. Nonresidential value was 6662.1 million, up 59.4%, and total building was 15564.1 million, up 36.3%, showing how lumpy (large) projects swing results.

How is Building Permits calculated?

1. Collect: gather every in-scope approval granted in the reference month with no sampling and no weighting.
2. Classify: code approvals by building type under standard classes and by work type as new or alterations (upgrades) and by ownership as private or public.
3. Count dwellings: add units across houses (H) plus dwellings excluding houses (E) plus public dwellings (P) so D equals H plus E plus P.
4. Sum value: add completed values excluding land, demolition and landscaping but including site preparation, with Goods and Services Tax (sales tax) included from July 2000.
5. Change: use rounded inputs of nearest dwelling and nearest 1000 Australian dollars, where change equals 100 times new minus prior divided by prior.
6. Adjust and compare: apply concurrent seasonal adjustment (reinstated from May 2022) with states adjusted independently, reconciled to the total, and publish trend alongside adjusted series. Factors are reviewed each year, usually before the May release. Chain volume measures (inflation adjusted values) use annually reweighted chain indexes and do not sum exactly.
7. Example: take house A at 350000 with 1 dwelling plus house B at 420000 with 1 dwelling plus a block at 1800000 with 6 dwellings. Total is 8 dwellings worth 2570000, and from a prior 10 the change is negative 20%.

Key point: Approval is not a home built, since some approvals never start and reported values can differ from final costs set later. Approvals lead future activity, while starts and completions decide what is built.