Housebuilding and affordable home statistics in the year to end of September 2025
An Official Statistics Publication for Scotland.
All Sector New Build
In the 12 months ending September 2025, there were 18,347 all sector homes built and 14,846 all sector new builds started.
There was a 5% decrease in all sector housebuilding starts and an 8% decrease in completions between the year to the end of September 2024 and the year to the end of September 2025.
In the 12 months ending September 2025, there were 18,347 homes built and 14,846 new builds started.
The private sector built 14,225 homes and the social sector built 4,122 homes. In terms of starts, building work on 11,815 was started by the private sector and 3,031 homes by the social sector.
Looking at years to the end September and excluding 2020 (where Covid-19 impacted housebuilding), private sector completions were the lowest since the year to the end of September 2018 and starts were the lowest since the year to the end of September 2013. In the social sector, completions were the lowest since the year to the end of 2017 and starts were the lowest since the beginning of this data collection from year to the end of September 1997.
Affordable Housing Supply Programme
In terms of the Affordable Housing Supply Programme, in the year to the end of September 2025, there were 5,222 approvals, 5,494 starts, and 6,582 completions of affordable homes. The number of completions was down by 23% (-1,931 homes) compared to the previous year. Approvals and starts also decreased by 22% (-1,460 homes) and 13% (-853 homes) between 2024 and 2025 (year ending September).
These statistics are used to inform progress against Scottish Government affordable housing delivery target to deliver 110,000 affordable homes by 2032, of which at least 70% will be for social rent and 10% will be in rural and island communities. By September 2025, 31,064 affordable homes have been completed towards the target. These completions consist of 24,112 (78%) homes for social rent, 4,345 (14%) for affordable rent, and 2,607 (8%) for affordable home ownership.
Background
Read the full publication Housing Statistics for Scotland Quarterly Update: New Housebuilding and Affordable Housing Supply to end September 2025 - gov.scot
There have been notable upward revisions to all sector new build starts (+575) and completions (+381) across January to March (Q1) 2025 and April to June (Q2) 2025, mainly due to private-sector activity in the City of Edinburgh. Further detail is provided in the Data and Methodology section of the main publication.
Background information including Excel tables and explanatory information on data sources and quality can be found in the Housing Statistics webpages.
Official statistics are produced in accordance with the Code of Practice for Statistics.