There were 5,841 new dwelling completions between January, February, and March (Q1) 2024, a fall of 12.1% on the same three months of 2023.
Apartment completions in Q1 2024 stood at 1,603, down 32.6% from Q1 2023.
There were 3,038 scheme dwelling completions in Q1 2024, down 1.4% from Q1 2023, while the number of single dwellings completed was 1,200, up 1.3% from Q1 2023.
More than half of completions (52.0%) were scheme dwellings, 27.4% were apartments, and 20.6% were single dwellings.
There was a decrease in completions from Q1 2023 to Q1 2024 for six of the eight regions of Ireland including a 25.3% fall in Dublin but increases occurred in the Midlands and South-East.
By Local Electoral Area (LEA), the most completions in Q1 2024 were 254 in Lucan, with the top 10 LEAs all being in or close to Dublin.
There has been a fall of 9.5% in seasonally adjusted new dwelling completions from Q4 2023 to Q1 2024.
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 1 2023 | 1,185 | 3,082 | 2,380 | 6,647 |
| Quarter 1 2024 | 1,200 | 3,038 | 1,603 | 5,841 |
| % change | 1.3% | -1.4% | -32.6% | -12.1% |
There were 5,841 new dwelling completions in the first quarter of 2024, a fall of 12.1% from the same quarter in 2023. Completions decreased by 32.6% for apartments from 2,380 in Q1 2023 to 1,603 in Q1 2024.
The Q1 data for 2024 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 there were 79 new bed spaces completed in Q1 2024.
In Q1 2024 the number of completions in urban areas was 4,877, falling 14.3% from 5,691 in Q1 2023. In rural areas, the number of completions rose slightly, with 964 in Q1 2024, up from 956 in Q1 2023. Of all completions in the quarter, 83.5% were in urban areas (See Table 2).
Six of the eight regions of Ireland saw a drop in completions from Q1 2023 to Q1 2024, with an increase in the other two regions. The largest relative decrease was in Dublin at 25.3% - with falls also in the Border (11.2%), Mid-East (9.7%), South-West (8.1%), West (2.8%), and Mid-West (1.9%) regions. The increases were in the Midlands (Laois, Longford, Offaly, Westmeath) (17.7%) and the South-East (Carlow, Kilkenny, Waterford, and Wexford) (6.8%) regions. Over three in ten (32.1%) completions in Q1 2024 were in Dublin, with just over a fifth (20.4%) in the Mid-East region (Louth, Meath, Kildare, and Wicklow) (See Figure 2).
Over three-quarters - 77.5% - of apartment completions this quarter were in Dublin (1,242). In Dublin City, 93.5% of completions in the quarter were apartments.
The most scheme completions were in the Mid-East region (866), while Cork County was the local authority with the most scheme completions (339). The West region (Galway City and County, Mayo and Roscommon) had the most single completions in Q1 2024 (194), with Galway County (115) 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 Q1 2024 was in Lucan (254). Ballyfermot-Drimnagh (217) was the LEA with the second highest number of completions. Wicklow was the only LEA 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 on 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 6,241 new domestic ESB connections in Q1 2024, a decrease of 14.8% from 7,324 in Q1 2023. 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 was 93.6% 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 is here considered to be a reconnection. There were 210 reconnections in Q1 2024, a decrease of 50.2% from 422 in Q1 2023. This fall in reconnections after two years reflects the decline in Non-Payment of Account Disconnections since 2019 reported by the Commission for Regulation of Utilities.
The number of previously finished dwellings in unfinished housing developments (UFHDs) is still very low with 44 in Q1 2024. The number of non-dwellings - mostly farm buildings - fell 31.9% from 213 in Q1 2023 to 145 this quarter. UFHDs accounted for just 0.7% of all connections this quarter (See Figure 5 and Table 4).
The highest number of reconnections in Q1 2024 was in the South-West region (45) followed by 29 in both the Border and in the West region. Non-dwellings were highest in the West (32) with the highest number of UFHDs in the Midlands (27). Dublin had the highest proportion of connections being new dwelling completions (32.1%) with the Border region having the lowest (5.1%) (See Table 5).
The average new dwelling size index over the first quarter of 2024 is at 73, a slight increase from 71 in 2023. This is likely due to the lower proportion of apartments in this quarter. In general, the decrease in this index since 2016 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 Building Energy Rating (BER) assessment data from the Sustainable Energy Authority Ireland (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 9.5% decrease in seasonally adjusted completions from 8,406 in Q4 2023 to 7,608 in Q1 2024. For apartment completions there has been a larger decrease of 36.4% from 3,166 in Q4 2023 to 2,014 in Q1 2024. There has been an 8.5% increase for scheme dwellings, up to 4,207, with a 1.8% rise for single dwellings, up to 1,388 (See Figure 7).
Statistician's Comment
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (25 April 2024) released New Dwelling Completions Quarter 1 (Q1) 2024. 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, Steven Conroy, Statistician, said: “The number of new dwelling completions in January, February, and March (Q1) 2024 was 5,841. This was a decrease of 12.1% from Q1 2023.
Completions by Dwelling Type
There were 1,603 apartment completions in Q1 2024, which was down 32.6% on the same quarter in 2023. Scheme completions fell 1.4% from Q1 2023 to Q1 2024 to stand at 3,038 this quarter and accounted for just over five in ten (52.0%) of all completions. Single dwellings rose 1.3% from 1,185 in Q1 2023 to 1,200 in Q1 2024.
More than half of all completions in Q1 2024 (52.0%) were scheme dwellings, 27.4% were apartments, and 20.6% were single dwellings.
Regional Breakdown
Six of the eight regions of Ireland saw a fall in completions from Q1 2023 to Q1 2024. The region with the largest relative decrease in completions was Dublin (-25.3%) while the Border (Cavan, Donegal, Leitrim, Monaghan, and Sligo) region saw the second largest decrease (-11.2%) in completions. Completions rose in the Midlands (Laois, Longford, Offaly, Westmeath) (17.7%) and South-East (Carlow, Kilkenny, Waterford, Wexford) (6.8%) over the same period.
More than three-quarters (77.5%) of apartment completions this quarter were in Dublin. In Dublin City, 93.5% of completions in this quarter were apartments. The most scheme completions were in the Mid-East (Kildare, Louth, Meath and Wicklow) while the West (Galway City and County, Mayo, and Roscommon) had the most single completions in Q1 2024.
The most completions in Q1 2024 by Local Electoral Area (LEA) were in Lucan, with the top 10 LEAs all being in or close to Dublin."