"Effectively builders are working through projects, maybe the lengthy projects from government grants from two or three years ago, which they're effectively losing money on."But they had no way of knowing prices would escalate by an average of 25 per cent a year during COVID.
Builders have sold assets to fund price rises to get homes built but insolvencies have increased nevertheless. Mr Janssen suggested well-directed, low interest and interest-free loans could provide builders with incentives to complete houses they were losing money on. Mr Janssen says the industry does not have the capacity to complete houses due to the labour shortage.