New home completions hit highest level since 2011 despite missing 2025 target

Apartment construction drove a sharp rise in housing output last year, though completions still fell short of Government targets

the total still falls short of the revised 2025 target of 41,000 homes, agreed in November 2024. Picture: Dan Linehan

A total of 36,284 new homes were completed in 2025, up 20.4% from 2024 and the highest annual figure since the series began in 2011, according to new figures.

Figures released by the Central Statistics Office show that much of the increase was driven by a surge in apartment completions, which reached 12,047 in 2025, up 38.7% from 2024.

Housing Minister James Browne welcomed the figures, saying they signal a “clear ramp-up in supply”.

However, the total still falls short of the revised 2025 target of 41,000 homes, agreed in November 2024. At the time, the Government said 41,000 homes would be completed in 2025, with output set to rise incrementally to 60,000 homes.

There were 18,308 scheme dwelling completions in 2025, an increase of 13.1% on 2024. Scheme dwellings are houses that form part of a multi-unit development of two or more houses connected to the ESB network.

A total of 5,929 single dwellings were completed in 2025, up 12.5% from 2024.

In 2025, scheme dwellings accounted for 50.5% of completions, apartments made up 33.2%, and single dwellings represented 16.3%.

More than half (57.6%) of all completions in 2025 were delivered in Dublin or the Mid-East — Kildare, Louth, Meath and Wicklow.

By local electoral area, Clondalkin in Dublin recorded the highest number of completions, with 1,399 homes finished in 2025.

In the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2025, 11,994 new dwellings were completed, a rise of 38.5% compared with Q4 2024.

Mr Browne said: “Another promising indicator, earlier this week, was evident in the latest mortgage drawdown data from the BPFI, which showed steady growth in activity in 2025, with drawdown volumes up almost 8% year on year.

“First-time buyers continue to drive the mortgage market, accounting for 60% of the volume of mortgage drawdowns in 2025. Indeed the 27,652 first-time buyer mortgages in 2025 represented the highest drawdown volumes since 2008.

“There are many pointers to progress, but we are not complacent. We have a new Housing Action Plan, Delivering Homes, Building Communities.

“We have record state funding. We have increasing confidence within the private sector. I am determined to take every action necessary to build on all of this and ensure even greater progress in the months and years ahead.”

In the Government’s new housing plan unveiled in November, it set a target of building just over 300,000 homes by 2030.

However, the plan removed annual housing delivery targets that had featured in previous strategies.

The change followed estimates indicating housing completions in 2025 would miss the original target by a wide margin. The Government had also touted close to 40,000 new homes in 2024 ahead of the general election, a figure that also fell well short.

In announcing the housing plan, Taoiseach Micheál Martin defended the removal of annual housing targets.

“When we had the annual targets under Housing for All and when we exceeded those targets, the annual ones, the riposte was ‘well, you should have set the targets higher and they weren’t high enough,” Mr Martin said.

“The bottom line is, we need 300,000 homes.” 

He denied removing metrics to assess the Government’s progress, while Tánaiste Simon Harris said completion figures and commencement notices would continue to be published regularly.

 - additional reporting from PA