A leading property firm has accused the Scottish Government of failing to tackle the country’s housing emergency after new figures showed housebuilding fell to its lowest level in more than a decade.
DJ Alexander said the latest Scottish Government housing statistics, which recorded a 4.4% fall in new build starts in 2025-26, demonstrated that the shortage of new homes was likely to worsen despite the housing emergency being declared more than two years ago.
The figures show 14,955 new homes were started across all sectors during the financial year, down from 15,648 in 2024-25 – the lowest annual total since 2012-13.
Private sector housebuilding accounted for the decline, with new build starts falling 11.9% to 11,018, the lowest annual figure since 2013-14. Social housing starts increased by 25.1% to 3,937, but DJ Alexander pointed out that this was the third lowest annual total of the past 11 years.
The company also highlighted wide regional disparities. Edinburgh recorded 1,850 new build starts during the year, accounting for 12.4% of Scotland’s total, compared with 831 in Glasgow.
David Alexander, chief executive of DJ Alexander Scotland, said: “Over two years after the Scottish Government declared a housing emergency, we continue to see little being done to address this issue. Indeed, this further reduction in new build starts indicates the situation is likely to get worse before it gets better.”
He said the continuing decline in private sector housebuilding was “a clear sign that this market is slowing down” and warned that concentrating so much development in and around Edinburgh risked creating “a two-tier housing market”.
Alexander added that low levels of housebuilding would continue to put pressure on house prices, the private rented sector and social housing unless the volume of new homes increased.
“Scotland needs more homes, and it needs them now,” he said.
