UK Construction and Law

Construction output falls 0.5 per cent over three months and private housing new work drops 4.9 per cent in July

By Staff Writer  |  12 September 2026

Official figures published on 11 September show total construction output down 0.5 per cent in the three months to July 2026, ending four consecutive three-monthly increases. The monthly figure rose 0.1 per cent, but the whole of that rise came from repair and maintenance while new work fell 0.4 per cent. Private housing new work fell 4.9 per cent in the month, the largest single drag on new work.

The three-monthly series is the one that matters for anyone pricing a pipeline, and it has turned. Total output is estimated to have fallen by 0.5 per cent in the three months to July 2026. That follows four consecutive increases, including growth of 1.3 per cent in the three months to April and 1.5 per cent in the three months to May. Across the latest three-month period new work fell by 0.4 per cent and repair and maintenance fell by 0.7 per cent, so neither side of the industry was holding the figure up.

Six of the nine sectors fell over the three months. The largest negative contribution came from private housing repair and maintenance, down 1.7 per cent.

The monthly figure reads better than it is

Monthly output rose by 0.1 per cent in July 2026, after a fall of 0.1 per cent in June and a fall of 0.8 per cent in May. The rise is real but narrow. All of it came from repair and maintenance, which grew 0.8 per cent, while new work fell 0.4 per cent. Within repair and maintenance the main contribution was private housing, up 1.7 per cent in the month, the same sector and the same figure that pulled the three-month series down, moving the other way over the shorter period.

The largest contribution to the fall in total new work was private housing new work, down 4.9 per cent in July. A month in which the only growth is repairing existing stock, while building new homes falls by close to five per cent, is not a recovery.

While the headline figure may show an increase in output in July, the fact that this came solely from repair and maintenance work reflects the challenging conditions impacting the industry.

Clive Docwra, managing director, McBains, 11 September 2026

What sits behind the housing number

The figures measure work done and chargeable to customers, excluding value added tax and payments to subcontractors, so they record activity on site rather than intention. On the development side the constraint is put at the point where a scheme is assembled rather than where it is built.

These figures are another reminder that housing ambition and housing delivery are two very different things. If we want a genuine reset in housebuilding, we must address the conditions that determine whether developers are prepared to commit capital and start building in the first place.

Neil Leitch, managing director of development finance, Hampshire Trust Bank

He set out the cost stack a promoter meets before a brick is laid: substantial sums spent getting a scheme through planning, then section 106, the community infrastructure levy, biodiversity net gain and the further costs and requirements attaching to building safety, with local planning authorities asked to administer a more complicated system while many remain under-resourced.

How much weight the figures carry

The survey turnover response rate for July 2026 was 80.0 per cent, an improvement on the first estimate response rates of 75.7 per cent in June and a step down from 83.3 per cent in May. No bias adjustment has been applied to early estimates since May 2020 while the approach is under review. The release contains no revisions to previously published data.

For contract administrators the practical reading is the split rather than the total. Repair and maintenance carried July on its own, private housing new work fell hardest, and the three-monthly trend has broken after four quarters of gains. Tender pricing, resourcing assumptions and programme risk on new-build residential work should be tested against that split rather than against the 0.1 per cent headline.