Metricon Homes named HIA's number one residential builder for third year running

The announcement came at the launch of the HIA-COLORBOND® steel Housing 100 Report in Melbourne earlier this week.

Metricon Homes reported a total of 4,764 starts – almost 400 more homes than last year - across Victoria, Queensland, New South Wales and South Australia. Of these starts, 3,876 were detached houses and 491 were semi-detached dwellings.

The Housing 100 Report found that the number of homes built by the top 100 builders in Australia has fallen for the first time in five years.

Representation in all states has fallen, with the exception of builders from Victoria.

HIA said in terms of building activity, 2017/18 will be recorded as one of the strongest years on record.

"We are expecting to see around 222,000 new homes commenced this last year, making it the second strongest year on record and the strongest year for detached house builders in 18 years," HIA said.

"Against this backdrop, it is surprising to see that the number of new homes built by the largest 100 home builders in the country did not increase."

HIA suggested building businesses have shifted their focus away from increasing the number of homes they build to focus on improving the efficiency of their business in preparation for a slowdown across the market over the next couple of years.

The key highlights from this year’s HIA–COLORBOND® steel Housing 100 Report for 2017/18 shows that the largest 100 residential builders:

- Increased revenue earned from home construction by 12.3 per cent to $25.39 billion in 2017/18.

- Reduced the number of new starts in the year by seven homes.

- Reduced their share of the new home building market from 34 per cent to 33 per cent.

- Accounted for 69 per cent of the detached homes built in Australia in 2017/18.

The number of starts required to make the list has also increased again, from 108 to 118 – the highest entry hurdle on record.