According to the National Institute of Statistics (INE), the annual variation rate of 5.8% in the New Housing Construction Cost Index (ICCHN) in March is 1 percentage point higher than that recorded in February and 2 percentage points higher than that in March 2025.
In the month under analysis, material prices increased by 3.7%, compared to 1.7% in February, and labour costs by 8.2%, 0.3 percentage points less than in the previous month.
The cost of labour contributed 3.8 percentage points (3.9 percentage points in the previous month) to the annual variation rate of the ICCHN, while materials contributed 2.0 percentage points (0.9 percentage points in February).
According to the INE, among the materials that most positively influenced the aggregate price variation are “glass and mirrors” and “diesel,” with increases of about 20%, and “bare copper wire” and “tiles and mosaics,” with increases of about 15% compared to the same period last year.
In the opposite direction, “bitumen” stood out, with a decrease of about 15%, and “air conditioning equipment” and “composite thermal insulation systems for the exterior,” with a decrease of about 5%.
The monthly variation rate (in March compared to February) of the ICCHN was 1.3%, 0.2 percentage points higher than the previous month and 0.9 percentage points above March of last year.
For the monthly variation, labour contributed 0.2 percentage points and the price of materials 1.1 percentage points (0.3 and 0.8 percentage points in February, respectively).
In the released highlight, INE revised upwards by 0.1 percentage points the variations of the ICCHN in January and February, to 3.9% and 4.8%, respectively, due to the upward revision of the cost of labour by 0.1 and 0.3 percentage points, in the same order.