This was a marked rise from the 1,824 added in the previous year, when Buckinghamshire increase of 0.8 per cent ranked only 14th among county council areas and 16th among LEPs.

Table 1: Housing growth in 2016-17

Source: DCLG, 2017 (live tables 100 & 123)

Although newly built dwellings make up the majority of additional dwellings, the conversion of office space to residential use has made a sizeable contribution to the growth of the housing stock in Buckinghamshire, adding 659 homes last year, including 351 covered by permitted development rights.

In 2015/16, 16.2 per cent of Buckinghamshire’s new dwellings were conversions from office space under permitted development rights.  This was the highest share of any county council area and well above the 10.0 per cent recorded across England. This share rose to more than 20 per cent in Chiltern and South Bucks, with both ranking in the top 10 among England’s 326 local authorities for the share of new homes delivered in this way. Wycombe ranked 35th and Aylesbury Vale 88th.

Last year a strong surge in new buildings meant that despite rising from 298 to 361, the share of additional dwellings delivered through permitted development fell to 12.4 per cent, well above the 8.7 per cent recorded across England, to rank 5th among both Local Enterprise Partnerships and county councils.  Both Wycombe and Chiltern delivered more than a quarter of their growth through office to residential permitted development.

The raw data are available here.

Table 2: Housing growth by LEP in 2016/17

Source: DCLG, 2017 (live tables 100 and 123)