While some analysts consider that the real sector in Lebanon is booming, due to increase in sales which was also reflected on Beirut Stock Exchange market by an increase of the price of share of solidere. However, our vision is not optimistic in this sector, as fewer investors are willing to lunch new real estate projects. This is due to the uncertainty shadowing over the Lebanese economic environment amid the political conflict and the failure to form a new government.
According to the data from the Orders Engineering in Beirut and Tripoli, the total construction permits witnessed a year-on-year (YOY) downtick of 0.43% to reach 11,015 permits by December 2020. Notably, the Construction Area Authorized by Permits (CAP) slumped by an annual 24.06% to 4.60M square meters (sqm), mainly reflecting the little interest of investors in undertaking new projects.
Compared to the same period last year, construction activity witnessed a prominent decline regionally. Across the governorates, Mount Lebanon (38.28% of the total permits) accounted for 4,115 permits compared to 3,761 by December 2019. However, for the South (29.67% of the total permits), the respective number of permits rose to 3,190 permits from 2,454 permits. In Nabatieh, (15.78% of the total permits), permits accounted for 2,044 compared to 1,485 permits by December 2019. In Bekaa and Beirut, 983 and 330 construction permits were issued by December 2020, down from 1,052 and 640 permits respectively in the same period last year.
Number of Construction Permits by December
