Monthly Housing Reporting

A monthly overview of Emergency Housing and the Public Housing Register.

The Monthly Housing Update compares the present month with the previous month and has some additional time series information. It has demographic details of clients and households in Emergency Housing and on the Public Housing Register at the end of each month.

Monthly Housing Update - A3

Excel tables

The following Excel tables provide a time series of the Emergency Housing Special Needs Grants and the Public Housing Register. This information is presented at a national level and by Work and Income regions, with key client demographic details.

Technical Information

The following document contains technical and other explanatory information about the Monthly Housing Update.

Release timetable

The Monthly Housing Reporting will be released on the following dates:

Emergency Housing Special Needs Grants (EH SNGs)

Emergency housing is short-term accommodation (usually in motels) for individuals who have an urgent need because they are unable to remain in their usual place of residence. It is funded through Special Needs Grants that clients apply for when they cannot access accommodation and we've explored all the other options available to them. Grants can cover between 1 and 21 nights accommodation at a time.

Public Housing Register

When New Zealanders are in need of Public Housing, their needs are recorded on either the Housing Register or the Transfer Register. The combined register is referred to as the Public Housing Register. The Public Housing Register is a non-time bound list of all applicants eligible to be housed in Public Housing.

How we report ethnicity

From December 2021, we are changing our reporting to an approach called ‘total response’. Making this change means that we recognise all aspects of someone’s ethnicity. This will reflect our clients more accurately, align our approach with Statistics NZ’s reporting and reflect best practice.

Ethnicity is about people’s identity and sense of belonging. Ethnicity measures cultural affiliation, rather than race, ancestry, nationality, or citizenship. Ethnicity is self-perceived and people can identify with more than one ethnic group. Previously, we reported ethnicity using an approach called ‘prioritised ethnicity’. Prioritised ethnicity means that we allocate people to a single ethnic group in an order of priority. The priority used by MSD was Māori, Pacific Peoples, Other and NZ European.

Confidentiality - Random Rounding

From 12 February 2021, the Ministry of Social Development (MSD) is applying a range of new confidentiality procedures to public data releases. These procedures will continue to protect client information while making more data available. To find out how we have changed the way we work with client information, visit:

Previous Monthly Housing Update Releases

Previous Monthly Housing Update have been archived and can be accessed below: