Copy article

GDP data - construction

ended 13. April 2023

According to the official GDP data published this morning, monthly construction output is estimated to have increased by 2.4% in volume terms in February 2023; this follows a 1.7% fall in January 2023. This means February 2023 had the highest monthly value in level terms (£15,558 million) since records began in January 2010. The increase in monthly construction output came from increases in both repair and maintenance (4.5%) and new work (1.1%) on the month, with eight out of the nine sectors seeing an increase on the month. At the sector level, the main contributors to the monthly increase were seen in private housing repair and maintenance and non-housing repair and maintenance, which increased 5.0% and 3.7%, respectively. Any thoughts on this, send them across ASAP as this story is BREAKING.

2 responses from the Newspage community

Copy all

Copy

With more people staying put rather than moving, we are seeing this data reflected in the amount of money spent on private housing repair. The headline numbers are positive, but if we drill down into what makes up the top figures, we see the reasons for the increase. The government should be striving to shift the balance onto new construction projects, but we have seen from their latest budget that they are a party out of ideas for how to stimulate this sector.
Copy

These increased construction output figures are a symptom of high mortgage costs. Instead of moving and spending thousands on stamp duty, homeowners are staying put and spending money on extending and improving their current homes. This is another sign house prices have a long way to fall yet.