A spike in the number of apartments approved in February caused a rise of more than ten per cent in housing approvals overall, according to figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics this week.
Dwelling approval figures for the month of February 2006 show that despite a rise of 10.6 per cent in approvals over the month, the trend for separate house approvals continues to fall, sliding 1.4 per cent in the same period.
On a state by state basis, the trend estimate for total dwelling units approved rose 0.6 per cent in February 2007. The trend rose by 3.5 per cent in Queensland, by 2.1 per cent in South Australia and to a lesser degree in Victoria (up 1.5 per cent). It dropped slightly in New South Wales (down 0.7 per cent), Tasmania (by 0.4 per cent) and the Australian Capital Territory (2.9 per cent).
Western Australia and the Northern Territory had the largest variations, dropping by 4.0 per cent and 8.5 per cent respectively.
