The surface area of construction permits in Lebanon, which reflects the level of future supply in the real estate sector stood at 420,956 sqm during the month of August 2020, down from 544,680 sqm in July. On a cumulative basis, the surface area of construction permits plunged by 43.91% y-o-y to 2,051,568 sqm in the first eight months of the current year, compared to 3,657,507 sqm during that same period last year.

As far as the geographical distribution of construction permits is concerned, the Mount Lebanon region continued to control the lion’s share of the total surface area of issued permits (837,824 sqm <40.84%>), followed by the South (589,333 sqm <28.73%>), Nabatieh (316,282 sqm <15.42%>), Bekaa (236,007 sqm <11.50%), and Beirut (47,211 sqm <2.30%>) regions. It is worth noting that figures for the North governorate are underestimated since they exclude permits issued by the North Order of Engineers.

The North governorate enjoyed the highest exploitation coefficient, which stood at 530 sqm per construction permit in the first eight months of 2020, followed by the Bekaa (482 sqm/transaction), Mount Lebanon (395 sqm/transaction), South (390 sqm/transaction), Nabatieh (337 sqm/transaction), and Beirut (233 sqm/transaction) governorates.