New residential property projects fall 36%

Planning permission applications for new residential housing projects in Lisbon fell 36% in the first two months of 2021.

This pipeline of just 400 homes in all reflects a strong contraction in activity compared with the same period in 2020 when 77 residential projects involving 620 homes was recorded.
The fall for the two periods are 36% and 53% respectively in terms of the number of projects. These results from Pipeline Imobiliário collated by Confidencial Imobiliário were based on pre-energy certificates issued by ADENE.
The greatest fall was seen in new build, with six new projects involving 110 homes recorded for 2021, a fall of 60% in planning permission licences like-for-like. Rehabilitation works contributed with 30 new projects in the pipeline submitted for planning permission this year for 290 new homes, 15% less than in the same period in 2020.
In Porto, the residential pipeline to February had 62 project for 430 new homes. This market too also experienced a slowdown on the same period in 2020, albeit a lesser contraction of 7% (460 in 2020) with the number of projects falling by 13% (71 in 2020).
New construction was responsible for 16 projects and 180 homes in the pipeline, rehabilitation contributing to another 46 projects with 250 homes.
Compared with 2020, new build lost pace in Porto with a fall of 38% in the number of homes. Rehabilitation, on the other hand, was more dynamic with a volume of homes 43% up on the same period in 2020.