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Annual housing supply in England down 6% on 2022-23: "housing market is still stuck in the slow lane"

ended 28. November 2024

New data published by the ONS this morning has shown that annual housing supply in England amounted to 221,070 net additional dwellings in 2023-24, a 6% decrease on 2022-23. Other key points below. Newspage asked experts for their views, bottom.

  • This resulted from 198,610 new build homes, 21,590 gains from change of use between non-domestic and residential, 4,360 from conversions between houses and flats and 1,900 other gains (caravans, house boats, etc), offset by 5,390 demolitions.
  • 767 of the net additions from new build homes were through ‘permitted development rights’ (full planning permission not required).
  • 8,825 of the net additions from change of use were through ‘permitted development rights’ (full planning permission not required). These comprised 6,695  additional dwellings from former offices, 564 from agricultural buildings, 99 from storage buildings, 62 from light industrial buildings,803 from commercial, business and service use buildings and 602 from other non-domestic buildings.
  • The loss of 22 dwellings from demolitions were through ‘permitted development rights’ (full planning permission not required).

5 responses from the Newspage community

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Ranald Mitchell
Director at bad credit mortgage specialists Charwin Mortgages
This data confirms what most of us already knew: the housing market is still stuck in the slow lane. With housebuilders tapping the brakes and schemes like Own New stalling on the grid, it’s no wonder supply is down 6%. Even the government seems to lack faith in hitting its own targets, quietly steering away from its grand manifesto promises. The truth is, we need a stronger push to restore confidence and get Britain building again, because, at this rate, we’re not just missing targets, we’re running out of road.
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Graham Cox
Director at Bridging Hub
The 6% drop in housing supply is hardly surprising given the sharp increase in mortgage rates. This has stifled demand. But it's encouraging to see unused office space being re-purposed for commercial to residential conversions under Permitted Development, up nearly 20% year-on-year.
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Darryl Dhoffer
Founder at The Mortgage Geezer
A 6% decrease in housing supply is not the kind of numbers this government, or in fact any government, will want to see. Perhaps the government should consider hiring more bureaucrats to process planning permissions faster, or maybe they could just build houses on the moon? After all, that seems to be the level of innovation we're seeing here. You'd have though we'd be able to build more homes considering the monumental effort of converting offices and agricultural buildings into dwellings. And let's not forget the revolutionary impact of permitted development rights, which have clearly solved the housing crisis. Not.
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Ken James
Director at Contractor Mortgage Services
This new data is bad but I still don't believe it tells the whole story. A reduction of 6% with all the upheaval in the UK economy and the changing of the guard in Number 10 is unsuprising. Todays figures show 221,070 new dwellings were built last year, but if we look back 10 years to 2013-14, the number was 142,490 so currently we are gaining an additional 78,580 extra stock compared to back then. With the current trend of repurposiong old commercial properties to residential, I am sure these figures will increase if Labour start to get their act together and support the building community in the drive for new homes. I would then hope we will see a return to positive numbers this time next year.
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Simon Bridgland
Broker at Charwin Private Clients
These figures won’t house a nation, desperate for chimney pots to call their own. Any shenanigans backstage need to be sorted out quick sharp if there is any hope of bringing numbers to anywhere near the pledge.