Three in four apartments approved in Metropolitan Sydney since 2020 have never broken ground. That figure, from Urbis research, sits at the heart of a housing delivery crisis the NSW government is now trying to address — but industry warns that access to finance is only part of the answer.
At the Property Council's NSW Housing Summit, Planning and Public Spaces Minister Paul Scully announced an expansion of the Pre-Sale Finance Guarantee, designed to support affordable housing, smaller developments, and projects in regional NSW that have struggled to attract funding.
Property Council NSW executive director Katie Stevenson (pictured) welcomed it as a targeted step.
"This is exactly the kind of practical intervention we need right now — focused on getting projects out of the ground, not just approved," she said, adding that the scheme had been developed in close collaboration between government and industry following calls for such a measure ahead of last year's NSW budget.
The expanded guarantee removes one obstacle, but Stevenson was direct about the deeper structural problem.
"The biggest challenge in NSW housing today is delivery. Too many projects have planning approval but are simply not financially viable to proceed under current settings," she said.
The pipeline data reinforces the point. Urbis research shows 75% of apartments approved in Metropolitan Sydney since 2020 have not progressed to construction, with starts still well below mid-2010s levels. In Western Sydney alone, more than 82,000 dwellings sit in the development pipeline but have yet to break ground, held back by labour shortages, feasibility constraints, and infrastructure servicing issues.
Development finance remains constrained, and the distance between approval and commencement continues to widen.
Housing Minister Rose Jackson echoed the concern at the same event, acknowledging that feasibility and financing pressures remain a fundamental brake on project momentum, while reaffirming the government's commitment to working constructively with industry.
With the NSW budget days away at the time of the summit, Stevenson framed the stakes plainly.
"It's positive to see the government clearly recognising that feasibility pressures are now a binding constraint on supply," she said. "With the budget just days away, the focus must be on backing delivery — making sure projects stack up, finance can flow, and more homes can move from approval to construction."
For brokers, budget measures that ease pre-sale thresholds would have an immediate effect on construction lending and the viability of projects their clients are financing.
The Property Council will host a budget conversation with the NSW Treasurer in Sydney on 25 June, where the organisation is expected to press for measures that can finally turn approvals into construction starts.
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