Austria housing construction costs up 5.9% year on year in October 2026
Austrian housing building costs rose 5.9% in the year to October 2026, a sixth month in a row above 5%, and the slowest of the four sectors.
The facts
- The Baukostenindex, the building cost index for housing and settlement construction, stood at 106.1 points in October 2026 on a 2025 base, +5.9% on the same month a year earlier.
- Statistics Austria states that this is the sixth month in a row in which the annual rise in housing construction costs exceeded 5.0%.
- Housing was the slowest of the four sectors measured: road construction +10.6%, water infrastructure +8.3%, bridge construction +7.8% and housing +5.9%. The gap between road and housing is 4.7 percentage points.
- Month on month, housing costs rose +0.2% in October, the smallest of the four: road construction +1.4%, bridge construction +0.3% and water infrastructure +0.3%.
- The agency marks both the September and the October 2026 figures as preliminary.
What it means for your money
- New-build costs are up more than 5% on the year. Glopra puts the Austrian asking level at 7,242.7 US dollars per square metre.
- For an owner already holding Austrian property who is building or renovating, October added little: housing costs rose 0.2% on the month, the smallest move of the four sectors.
- On a project that also involves roads or utilities, the cost side is rising faster: road construction 10.6%, water infrastructure 8.3% and bridge construction 7.8% over the year, all above the 5.9% for housing.
What to watch
- Both the September and the October readings are preliminary, so either can be revised in a later release.
- The next monthly Baukostenindex shows whether the run of annual rises above 5.0% reaches a seventh month.
- Statistics Austria publishes construction prices in a separate, quarterly index, the Baupreisindex. The two are different indexes on different frequencies, so their readings are not interchangeable.
Sources: Statistics Austria https://www.statistik.at/fileadmin/announcement/2026/11/20261113BaukostenindexOktober2026.pdf; Statistics Austria https://www.statistik.at/fileadmin/announcement/2026/11/20261110Baupreisindex2026Q3EN.pdf