Scotland is heading for a housing catastrophe sector body Homes for Scotland (HFS) said in response to the latest Scottish Government housing statistics published today which show continued declines in all-tenure housing starts and completions highlighting a significantly worsening situation.

The figures show that there were 17,336 homes completed and 14,999 homes started across all sectors in 2025, representing annual decreases of 13% and 6% respectively.

This continues a sustained downward trend in housebuilding activity, with both private and social sectors experiencing significant reductions. Notably, private sector starts are at their lowest since 2013 and social sector starts at their lowest since records began, further highlighting the strong interdependencies between private and social delivery.

HFS warned that the situation is being exacerbated by a chronic shortage of effective housing land. The findings of HFS’s recent research on Scottish Land Supply identified a critical shortfall in deliverable housing land across many local authority areas, which could see housing completions decline by a further 70 per cent to 5,000 per annum by 2031. The report concluded that constraints within the planning system and a lack of allocated, viable land are severely limiting the sector’s ability to build the all-tenure homes Scotland urgently needs.

Jane Wood, Chief Executive of HFS said the figures demonstrate that the housing emergency is not only persisting but deepening:

“These latest figures confirm what our members are experiencing on the ground, a continued and worrying decline in the delivery of new homes across Scotland.

“Whilst the last six months of 2025 saw positive increases in approvals for the Affordable Housing Supply Programme, this is against an incredibly low bar in the context of one of the most challenging years in housing delivery where the affordable housing budget was cut by over 26 per cent and saw over 1,800 affordable homes stalled.

“Today’s statistics should be of major concern to everyone and directly challenge the Scottish Government’s ambition to increase all-tenure housing delivery 10 per cent year-on-year. Without urgent action from all parties in May’s election, today’s housing emergency risks becoming a national catastrophe.”

Jane Wood continued:

“Our recent research on housing land supply makes it clear that the pipeline of deliverable sites is simply not sufficient to support the level of all-tenure home building Scotland requires.

“Unless the planning system consistently identifies and releases more effective land, and does so more quickly, the decline in starts we are seeing today will inevitably translate into even fewer completions in the years ahead. We look forward to working with the next Scottish Government to identify the urgent actions required to meaningfully address the land supply crisis over both the immediate and long term.”

HFS stressed that reversing the current downward trajectory is essential not only to meet housing need but also to support economic growth, the sustainability of local communities and the transition to net zero.

Jane Wood concluded:

“The consequences of inaction are clear: fewer homes, rising housing costs and increasing social inequality across the country. We need urgent intervention now to boost all-tenure housing supply or Scotland risks falling even further behind.”

ENDS

31 March 2026