There were 8,452 new dwelling completions in Quarter 3 (Q3) 2023, an increase of 14.4% on the same three months of 2022.
Apartment completions rose 47.3% in the 12 months to Q3 2023, to 3,373.
There were 3,627 scheme dwelling completions in Q3 2023, up 1.5% from Q3 2022, while single dwellings were down 4.7% to 1,452 in Q3 2023.
Over four in ten (42.9%) completions in Q3 2023 were scheme dwellings, with 39.9% apartments and 17.2% single dwellings.
There was an increase in completions from Q3 2022 to Q3 2023 for six of the eight regions of Ireland including a 36.7% rise in Dublin, but falls occured in the South-West and South-East.
By Local Electoral Area (LEA), the most completions in Q3 2023 were in Tallaght South with 604, almost double that of the second highest LEA (329 in Lucan).
There has been a rise of 12.3% in seasonally adjusted new dwelling completions from Q2 2023 to Q3 2023.
Single dwellings are one-off dwellings connected to the ESB network.
Scheme dwellings are houses that form part of a multi-unit development of two or more houses connected to the ESB network.
Apartment dwellings are within a multi-unit development and are specifically identified by the ESB as apartments.
| New Dwelling Completions | ||||
| Single | Scheme | Apartment | Totals | |
| Quarter 3 2022 | 1,524 | 3,574 | 2,290 | 7,388 |
| Quarter 3 2023 | 1,452 | 3,627 | 3,373 | 8,452 |
| % change | -4.7% | 1.5% | 47.3% | 14.4% |
There were 8,452 new dwelling completions in the third quarter of 2023, a rise of 14.4% from the same quarter in 2022. By dwelling type, it is in apartments where this year-on-year increase is seen with a rise of 47.3% from 2,290 apartment completions in Q3 2022 to 3,373 in Q3 2023.
The Q3 data for 2023 also shows that:
The primary data source used for the New Dwellings Completions series is the ESB Networks new domestic connections dataset, where the date that the connection is energised determines the date of completion. It is accepted that the ESB domestic connections dataset is overestimating new dwellings and the CSO has adjusted for this overcount by using additional information from the ESB and other data sources.
ESB connections are classified into four categories: new dwelling completions, UFHDs (previously finished houses in Unfinished Housing Developments), reconnections and non-dwellings. The dwelling type (single, scheme, apartment) and urban-rural divide are defined by the ESB Network. See Background Notes for a more detailed discussion of the classification.
The New Dwelling Completions series is based on the number of domestic dwellings connected by the ESB Network to the electricity supply and may not accord precisely with geographical boundaries.
The CSO has utilised other available data sources to validate and enhance the ESB connections dataset. However, this was only possible where the connections dataset could be confidently linked to another dataset using unique identifiers or by address matching. As the level of Eircode collection, coverage and storage increases across data sources in the housing sector, it is expected that the precision of estimates on new dwelling completions can be further enhanced.
The ESB connections data - with adjustments as detailed above - is the most consistent manner of measuring housing completions with connections made in the same way by one organisation, ESB Networks, across the country. No other currently available sources have this same level of consistency nor accuracy in identifying numbers of individual units.
There has been a significant level of construction output in the student accommodation sector. These are generally connected to the ESB Network as commercial connections and are therefore not included in the ESB domestic connections dataset used for the new dwelling completions. Further to this the data available on this sector is on a “bed space” basis and it is not currently possible to report on it as dwellings, which are self-contained units of living accommodation. Based on consultation with stakeholders in this sector, student accommodation may be included in future New Dwelling Completions reports as a separate category. Information on completed student bed spaces is provided by the Higher Education Authority (HEA). They have detailed to the CSO that 256 new bed spaces were completed in Q3 2023.
In Q3 2023 the number of completions in urban areas was 7,262, up 19.6% from 6,074 in Q3 2022. In rural areas there was a fall in completions, down 9.4% from 1,314 in Q3 2022 to 1,190 in Q3 2023. Of all completions in the quarter, 85.9% were in urban areas. See Table 2.
Six of the eight regions of Ireland saw a drop in completions from Q3 2022 to Q3 2023, with a decrease in the other two regions. The largest relative increase was in Dublin at 36.7% - with rises also in the Midlands (25.9%), Border (14.9%), Mid-West (13.8%), West (3.1%) and Mid-East (0.3%) regions. The decreases were in the South-West (Cork City and County Kerry) - 11.8% - and the South East (Carlow, Kilkenny, Waterford, and Wexford) (0.6%) regions.
Over four in ten (42.2%) completions in Q3 2023 were in Dublin, with almost a fifth (19.7%) in the Mid-East (Louth, Meath, Kildare, and Wicklow). See Figure 2.
Over four-fifths - 80.8% - of apartment completions this quarter were in Dublin (2,727). Almost all (97.5%) of the completions in Dublin City this quarter were apartments with over three-quarters of completions (76.4%) across the whole county being apartments, and this was over half for all four Dublin local authorities. The most scheme completions were in the Mid-East (1,157), while Kildare was the local authority with the most scheme completions (384). The South-West region (Cork and Kerry) had the most single completions in Q3 2023 (264), with Cork County (172) the local authority with the most one-off dwelling completions. See Table 3.
Classification into local authorities has taken into account boundary changes between Cork City and Cork County which came into effect in May 2019. All historical data within the tables below and the PxStat interactive tables have been revised to now be based on the new boundaries. However, data within archived releases remain unchanged.
The most completions by Local Electoral Area (LEA) in Q3 2023 was in Tallaght South (604), which was almost double that of the second highest LEA (329 in Lucan). Naas and Wicklow were the only LEAs outside of Dublin in the top ten Local Electoral Areas with the most completions this quarter. See Figure 3.
New dwelling completions by LEA going back to 2012 by year and quarter can be viewed in the PxStat tables NDA05 and NDQ09. There is also data available by Eircode Routing Key by year and quarter in PxStat tables NDA01 and NDQ07. Data is also available of new dwelling completions by Dwelling Type and Urban Area by year and quarter in tables NDA12 and NDQ10. Urban Area (also known as Built Up Area) is a new geography created for census 2022 which defines urban boundaries as at census 2022.
There was a total of 9,047 new domestic ESB connections in Q3 2023, an increase of 5.9% from 8,540 in Q3 2022. The ESB domestic connections series continues to show a comparable trend to the NDC series compiled by the CSO as shown in Figure 4. The number of new dwelling completions as a percentage of total ESB domestic connections continues to increase, standing at 93.4% this quarter.
There are still some small differences in volume between the two series. The starting point for the NDC series is the ESB domestic connections dataset, with adjustments made to account for previously finished houses in unfinished housing developments (UFHDs), reconnections and non-dwellings as shown in Figure 5 and Table 4.
A property that is reconnected to the ESB Network after having been disconnected for more than two years is assigned a new Meter Point Reference Number (MPRN) and is therefore included in the ESB new connections datasets and here considered to be a reconnection. There were 367 reconnections in Q3 2023, a decrease of 48.0% from 706 in Q3 2022.
The number of previously finished dwellings in unfinished housing developments (UFHDs) is still very low with 54 in Q3 2023, down 75.1% from Q3 2022. The number of non-dwellings - mostly farm buildings - fell 24.0% from 229 in Q3 2022 to 174 this quarter. See Figure 5 and Table 4.
The highest number of reconnections in Q3 2023 was in the West region (59) where 9% of new connections were reconnections. Non-dwellings were highest in the Mid-East (30) and West (30) regions. The South-East region had the highest number of UFHDs (16) which was 29.6% of all UFHDs this quarter. Dublin had the highest proportion of connections being new dwelling completions (98.3%) with the Border region having the lowest (83.1%). See Table 5.
Figure 6 shows that the average new dwelling size is continuing to gradually fall year on year. The average new dwelling size index over the first three quarters of 2023 is at 73. This decrease is driven by both an increase in the proportion of completed dwellings being apartments and a decrease in the size of dwellings, particularly single dwellings. See Table 6. The average new dwelling size index is obtained by linking ESB connections to BER assessment data from the SEAI for new dwelling completions. See Table 7 in Background Notes for match rates.
A seasonal adjustment has been applied to the new dwelling completions to show an additional measure of change over time. This allows for a quarter-on-quarter comparison. See Background Notes for more detail on the seasonal adjustment.
For all house types, there has been a 12.3% increase in seasonally adjusted completions from 7,749 in Q2 2023 to 8,702 in Q3 2023. For apartment completions there has been a larger increase of 60.7% from 2,169 in Q2 2023 to 3,485 in Q3 2023. There has been a 9% decrease for scheme dwellings, down to 3,793, with a 0.7% rise for single dwellings, up to 1,424. See Figure 7.
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Statistician's Comment
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (25 October 2023) released New Dwelling Completions Quarter 3 (Q3) 2023. The CSO uses new connections to the electricity network as the basis for statistics on new dwelling completions, a data source that is collected nationally by one organisation in a consistent manner for all dwellings (See Background Notes for more information).
Commenting on the release, Justin Anderson, Statistician, said: “The number of new dwelling completions in July, August, and September (Q3) 2023 was 8,452. This was up by 14.4% from Q3 2022.
Completions by Dwelling Type
Apartment completions rose 47.3% from Q3 2022 to Q3 2023 to stand at 3,373 this quarter and accounted for just under four in ten (39.9%) of all completions. Scheme dwellings rose by 1.5% to 3,627, while single dwellings fell 4.7% from 1,524 in Q3 2022 to 1,439 in Q3 2023.
Regional Breakdown
The region with the biggest relative increase in the twelve months to Q3 2023 was Dublin (36.7%) with rises also in the Midlands (25.9%), Border (14.9%), Mid-West (13.8%), West (3.1%), and Mid-East (0.3%) regions. There was a decrease in completions in the South-West (-11.8%) and South-East (-0.6%) over the same period.
More than four-fifths (80.8%) of apartment completions in Q3 2023 were in Dublin. Almost all (97.5%) of completions in Dublin City this quarter were apartments, and apartments accounted for more than three-quarters (76.4%) of all completions across the county.
The most completions in Q3 2023 by Local Electoral Area (LEA) were in Tallaght South where there were 604 completions, almost double that of the second highest LEA (329 in Lucan)."