Housing – then and now

This Issue This is a part of the Changing housing demand feature

By - , Build 130

Since World War II, the face of New Zealand housing has changed. Some of the key points are shown in this look back to the 50s.

Figure 3: Multi-units of a percentage of all dwelling consents.
Figure 1: Average floor area for detached houses (Source: Quotable Value NZ and BRANZ) and declining number of people per dwelling (Source: Statistics NZ Longitudinal Data Series).
Figure 2: Owner-occupied dwellings. (Source: CHRANZ, Morrison 2008.)
Figure 4: House claddings. (Source: 2004 BRANZ House Condition Survey.)

The 1950s marked the beginning of a period of change when new home builds and home ownership began to accelerate. Before then, the average number of new dwellings was around 5,000–8,000 per year. In the mid 1970s, migration peaked and so did new housing, with nearly 40,000 houses built in 1974, followed by a collapse in the late 1970s to around 14,500 new houses in 1981. The rocky road has continued as we again reach a similar low following a high of 31,400 new dwellings in 2004.

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Figure 3: Multi-units of a percentage of all dwelling consents.
Figure 1: Average floor area for detached houses (Source: Quotable Value NZ and BRANZ) and declining number of people per dwelling (Source: Statistics NZ Longitudinal Data Series).
Figure 2: Owner-occupied dwellings. (Source: CHRANZ, Morrison 2008.)
Figure 4: House claddings. (Source: 2004 BRANZ House Condition Survey.)

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