Housing developments worth almost $25bn approved in Sydney last year

The Sydney communities bearing the brunt of building thousands of new homes in a desperate scramble to meet the state’s ambitious housing targets can be revealed. FULL LIST HERE.

The Sydney communities bearing the brunt of building thousands of new homes in a desperate scramble to meet the state’s ambitious housing targets can be revealed, as close to $25 billion worth of residential development was secured across NSW in the past year.

Australian Bureau of Statistics data, released last week, confirmed a total of 42,392 homes were approved for construction in NSW, throughout the 2023-24 financial year.

The northwest Sydney community of The Hills saw the highest number of homes – 2504 – approved in the 12 months to June 30, to the tune of $1.4 billion.

Its Western Sydney neighbours in the Blacktown local government area approved $992 million worth of residential development applications for 2382 new homes.

Meanwhile, in Parramatta, $885 million in residential development got the green light across 2028 homes. In Sydney’s southwest, Liverpool Council approved 1914 new homes in the past year, valued $742 million.

At the other end of the list, ABS data shows just 24 new homes were approved in the past year in Hunters Hill, while 104 were given the green light in Mosman.

A total of 139 new residential homes were approved in North Sydney.

The release of councils doing the heavy lifting in the fight for more houses come as new research from NSW parliament reveals that even if the state meets its massive housing targets, a rise in the number of new homes on the market isn’t expected to drive down prices any time soon. 

“While it is necessary to ensure new housing supply flows are sufficient to meet demands from population growth, it is likely the case that the impact of the new supply on prices and rents will not emerge in the short-run,” the researcher said. 

“Alongside supply policies, other measures that address short-run affordability concerns for low-income households are important.”

The analysis, developed by the NSW Parliamentary research team, also revealed Sydneysiders are being slugged close to 70 per cent more to buy a new home than what it costs a developer to build it.

The research paper, reviewing Reserve Bank of Australia analyses, also found the price new-home buyers paid to purchase an apartment in Sydney was 68 per cent higher than the cost of supplying the home.

An artist’s impression of the plan for development in Bella Vista, in The Hills district. Picture: Supplied

Despite ballooning costs in Sydney, homebuyers in greater Melbourne are forking out a 20 per cent premium, while that figure drops to just 2 per cent in Brisbane.

“Another study estimated that zoning restrictions raised the average price of houses in Sydney 73 per cent above the cost of supplying a new house, compared to 69 per cent in Melbourne and 42 per cent in Brisbane,” the researcher said.

Planning Minister Paul Scully told The Saturday Telegraph additional homes being added to the property market “will help to moderate rent and house price increases”.

“An example of a similar market to Sydney where this has occurred in recent years is Auckland,” he said.

Planning Minister Paul Scully said housing supply had to be increased. Picture: Nikki Short

“Since 2018, housing construction has been in decline, while at the same time house prices in NSW have increased by 44 per cent.

“This has created the housing availability and affordability crisis that we are experiencing today.”

Mr Scully said sweeping housing reforms were just the start of the redevelopment of the planning system.

“There is no escaping the need to increase housing supply to address the problems of a lack of available housing while also catering for changing household composition,” he said.

“That’s why we’ve rebalanced growth across Sydney and setting fairer ambitious targets for councils with incentives for those who meet their targets and performance orders for those who do not.”

Originally published as Housing developments worth almost $25bn approved in Sydney last year