Compared to the same month of the previous year, the number of construction permits for residential building increased in January by 28.7 percent, reaching 2009 permits. The rise was driven by higher demand in all regions of the country, according to the National Institute of Statistics (INS).
Of the 2009 permits issued in January 2018, 66.9 percent were for the rural area. In January 2017, the share of rural permits was lower – 61.2 percent.
INS data shows that the regional distribution shows an increase in the number of permits issued for residential buildings, compared to January 2017, in all development regions: North-East (+115), South Muntenia (+80), West (+77), South-West Oltenia (+59), South-East (+57), North-East (+32), Bucharest-Ilfov (+16) and Centre (+12).
In 2017, the number of permits had increased by 7.6 percent from 2016, reaching 41,603 in total. In 2016, the number had decreased by 1.2 percent from the previous year.