Small Apartments a New Hit in Construction Business

In the real estate business, 2018 will go down as a year that saw a significant increase in the number of small apartments built. A total of 1,390 two-room apartments were built around the country, compared to 834 in 2017. With that, the percentage of such small apartments was just 4 percent of the total number of apartments built.

Two-room apartments are popular for young couples and singles, and often are used as “starter” homes for newly married couples. Because of the their small size, they are much more affordable than bigger apartments – and hence very popular. Most of the small apartments were built in Tel Aviv. Three room apartments, which until recently were considered adequate even for families with kids, constituted just 6 percent of housing starts in 2018.

The most popular size of new apartments are those with four rooms (three bedrooms). Of the total number built, 39 percent were of this size. More than half of building starts, however, were apartments with five or more rooms.

Yitzchak Laks, CEO of the Eldad Peri Group, which specializes in building small apartments, said that “the increase in construction of small apartments is welcome, but we still have a lot of work to do in order to make them more available in the market, especially in areas of high demand. Small apartments are an important component of Israeli housing stock, appropriate for students, singles, divorcees, and others. Using creative measures we can arrive at the right mix of sizes of apartments to satisfy demand and ensure that they are economically feasible in all towns.”