The names on this list might be stable, but their rankings have changed significantly. The largest of these
business in 2020, with 4,500 starts last year, is Metricon. While dominating the list for the past five years,
and extending its lead this year, Metricon have slowly shifted up the list from number 63 back in 1993/94.
Despite its recent dominance, Metricon accounts for just 2.5 per cent of all new homes built in Australia. At
the other end of the spectrum, the last builder on this year's list started just two homes per week. These are
the exact same market dynamics that existed in 1993/94 with a large number of small business accounting for the majority of the list. The Western Australian market is the only exception to this rule where the 10
largest builders account for just over half of all starts in the last year.
Not only is home building dominated by small business, more than 70 per cent of builders on the list operate
in just one state. Less than 10 per cent of builders operate across more than three states. Consolidation
within the industry in recent years has seen this number grow as the larger businesses on this list have
purchased existing businesses in order to grow their share of the market. But despite this, the industry remains dominated by locally based businesses.
Finally, another feature of this report is that the largest 100 building business are predominantly privately owned. Less than 10 per cent of businesses on the list are publicly held companies. The rest are familyowned or private companies. Many have the name of their founder in their title.
Despite surviving the challenges of the past 30 years, 2020 brought with it a new challenge. At no other time
in the history of this report have these businesses been faced with the risk of being forced to stop building.
The industry was very fortunate to be able to continue to build new homes through the COVID shock. With
rapid changes to accepted worksite practices, the industry avoided the most severe restrictions.
New housing starts at the end of the 2020 financial year were projects initiated prior to the emergence of the
COVID restrictions in March. The impact of this shock and the subsequent HomeBuilder program will evolve
in 2021 and 2022.
This COVID shock compounded what was already a difficult year in 2018/19. A slowing in population growth
and a bank imposed credit squeeze caused one of the sharpest corrections in home building on record, with
the number of new housing starts falling from over 220,000 in 2018/19 to an estimated 169,000 in 2019/20.
Despite the cooling market, the 28th annual HIA–Colorbond® steel Housing 100 Report 2019/20 survey shows that the number of new home starts by the nation's largest 100 builders increased from 67,694 to
69,459.
The market share of the Housing 100 builders increased from 35 per cent in 2018/19 to 40 per cent in
2019/20. This is the highest market share for the largest 100 home builders since 2013/14 and is consistent
with previous trends where volume home builders are able to gain market share in a contracting market. This also suggests that smaller builders, particularly those outside of the largest 100 home builders, are
experiencing a disproportionate share of this market contraction.

Apartment builders continued to increase their representation on the list as the demand for higher density living reached a new peak. This year the number of units constructed by the largest 100 builders rose by 11.2 per cent, while the number of detached homes contracted by 1.0 per cent.
Accelerating rapidly up the list, is the second most active builder in 2019/20 – and the nation's largest
apartment builder – was Hutchies with 3,820 housing starts, followed by Multiplex with 3,486 starts.
There were also just 12 participants that advanced up the list by more than 100 starts in the year, with
apartment construction the largest share of this growth.
The stronger representation of apartment builders on this year's list reflects an ongoing trend toward higher
density homes with the number of apartments built by participants increasing by more than seven per cent
this year.
The key highlights from this year's HIA–Colorbond® steel Housing 100 Report 2019/20 shows that the largest 100 residential builders:
 increased their share of the new home building market from 35 per cent to 40 per cent
 accounted for 68 per cent of the detached homes built in Australia in 2019/20
 increased revenue earned from home construction by 13.2 per cent to $24.097 billion in 2019/20
 increased the number of new starts in the year by 1,765 homes
 the number of starts required to make the list has also increased from 100 to 108
 the number of detached house starts declined by 1.0 per cent while the number of units increased by 11.2 per cent
Major activity In 2019/20, only 68 per cent of housing activity was detached home building. This is significantly lower than
the 81 per cent recorded a decade earlier and reflects an ongoing growth in higher density home construction.
Semi-detached homes maintained its market share of eight per cent, while the multi-unit share remained
constant at 24 per cent of the Housing 100. This relatively poor year for detached home building isn't
likely to continue into 2020/21.
State by state
In the 2019/20 financial year, Victoria continued to
dominate new home building due to a decade of strong population growth. At the other end, Western Australia
was at the bottom of a deep and sustained downturn.
Policy settings are changing rapidly and the implications for these will see a shift in the state-by-state dynamic.
There is mounting evidence that government efforts to contain the spread of COVID-19 has been effective and
the policy agenda is progressively refocusing on the
economic recovery. Just as government decisions relating to industry shutdowns were the catalyst for
recession, government decisions will now dictate how quickly Australia's economy recovers.
The impact of changes to migration flows and financial support packages for households and businesses will not be evenly spread across regions.
The Australian Government announced the HomeBuilder package in June providing fiscal incentives for
some households who build a new home or undertake a major home renovation (including knock-downrebuild), which complement the existing support measures for first home buyers. The Western Australian Government announced a substantial package to generate demand for residential building activity from Starts
2019/20 69,459
2018/19 67,694
Market Share
2019/20 40 per cent
2018/19 35 per cent
Revenue*
2019/20 $24,097 m
2018/19 $21,291 m
Main Housing Activity
Detached Houses 68 per cent
Semi-Detached Dwellings 8 per cent
Multi-units 24 per cent
Housing 100 at a glance
*Estimated revenue earned from sales of housing only. Excludes land. Not all participants provided information.
2019/20
P4 HIA – COLORBOND® steel Housing 100
households, and the public housing and social housing sectors. Western Australia is also in a unique position due to the pent-up demand for housing, relatively stable employment base and a low reliance on migration for growth in gross state product. It is population growth that could pull Western Australia out of this prolonged downturn.

For further information regarding our housing starts composition forecasts go to: https://hia.com.au/businessinformation/economic-information/housing-forecasts
The Housing 100