The Glenigan February 2025 Review shows a mild end to 2024 and start to 2025, with the economy causing a sluggish start.
The post Glenigan February 2025 Review sees start value drop 19% appeared first on Planning, Building & Construction Today. 
The latest Glenigan Review has been released, showing a slowdown in major project starts in the three months to January.
Year-on-year, planning approvals have also been shown to fall by 24%.
The review focuses on November 2024 to end of January 2025
The projects covered in the review are split into major and underlying projects, depending on whether the project is worth more or less than £100m.
The data provides professionals within the built environment with a unique insight into the performance of the sector over the last year.
The data shows that not many major projects actually broke ground in the period, causing a 19% fall in total project start value. There was, however, growth in underlying project starts, especially in private housing, but not enough to offset the drop.
This has caused a weaker development pipeline, fewer main contract awards, and fewer planning approvals.
The UK economy saw a sluggish final few months of 2024, causing a lower growth forecast, which may benefit the construction industry through base rate cuts allowing for lower cost borrowing. It may also stimulate the consumer and housing market.
Housing remained strong
In spite of the drops in value, housing project starts saw growth in most UK regions, but the slump in planning approvals also hit this sector. Private housing accounted for 68% of the housing projects started throughout the year, totalling £8.045m in project value.
The South East remained the most active region for residential projects, starting at £1.599m, whereas the East of England and Scotland saw growth of 73% and 86%, or £1.422m and £1.388m, respectively.
London had the most planning approvals with £4,144m and accounting for 27% of the sector. The South East accounted for 15% of approvals.
Glenigan are urging for cautious optimism again, thanks to house prices increasing in January and more sellers entering the market. This could cause an estimated increase of 13% in private housing construction this year, and an 11% increase in social housing construction.
The government could expedite this through targeted policy interventions to unlock growth in the construction sector.
Allan Wilen, Glenigan’s economic director, said: “While housing projects are still lagging compared to last year, the government’s focus on housebuilding and increasing consumer confidence should help form a growing development pipeline. The key will be translating this potential into actual construction starts.”
In the previous Glenigan forecast, it was predicted that 2025 would see growth for the construction industry after a slow start.
The full Glenigan February 2025 review can be read on their website.
The post Glenigan February 2025 Review sees start value drop 19% appeared first on Planning, Building & Construction Today.
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