New project approvals in the city hit a decade low in 2025, even as a wave of zoning-driven construction ramps up in the suburbs. Here’s what agents should know about the growth pattern and the risk that tends to follow it.

Anyone driving through the Seaport or past the South Station tower could be forgiven for assuming Boston is still in the middle of a building boom. In some pockets, it is. But the citywide numbers tell a more complicated story, and the neighborhoods actually seeing the fastest growth right now aren’t always the ones getting the headlines.

The numbers behind the slowdown

The Boston Planning Department approved about 5.8 million square feet of new development in 2025, valued at roughly $4.8 billion. That’s down by half from 2024’s 11.6 million square feet, and it’s the smallest amount of new development the city has approved in a single year in over a decade, both in total project size and estimated cost.

Over the past 10 years combined, the city approved about 124.5 million square feet of development worth an estimated $70 billion, so 2025’s total is a real outlier, not just a slow quarter. Higher construction and financing costs over the past several years, along with uncertainty around federal trade policy, are the main factors cited for the pullback. Commercial property values in Boston have now declined for a second straight year, and office buildings sold at steep losses in 2025, which adds pressure on a city budget that leans heavily on property taxes.

None of that means construction has stopped. The Seaport District alone still generates something like 10% of the city’s overall tax base, and big, already-approved projects are still finishing out. The South Station tower, one of the more complicated builds in the city’s recent history, delivered 51 stories of office and residential space this past year. The slowdown is in new approvals, not necessarily in what’s currently rising out of the ground.

The real growth story is happening outside the city

While Boston’s approval pipeline cools, a different kind of construction wave is building in the suburbs, driven by the state’s MBTA Communities Act, which requires many cities and towns served by the T to zone for multifamily housing near transit.

Where the pipeline is concentrated

As of January 2026, the region-wide pipeline tied to that law included roughly 6,898 housing units across 102 projects spread over 34 municipalities. The biggest contributors:

• Lexington — 1,286 units across 12 separate projects, nearly a fifth of the entire pipeline on its own
• Westford — 830 units
• Braintree — 752 units, largely from a single large project
• Weston — 480 units
• Everett — 407 units
• Taunton — 275 units

Early pipeline, not yet a skyline

It’s worth being clear about what that pipeline actually represents right now. Most of it is still moving through permitting rather than active construction. In Lexington, for example, only four of the 12 permitted projects have broken ground so far. And just 19 large projects, meaning 100 units or more, account for over three-quarters of all the units in the pipeline, while the other 83 projects only average around 19 units each. This is a real shift, but it’s an early and uneven one. Zoning reform opens the door to this kind of housing; it doesn’t guarantee it gets built on any particular timeline, especially with materials and labor costs still elevated.

For agents, that distinction matters. A town added to the MBTA Communities list isn’t necessarily under construction today, but it’s very likely to see permitting activity, site work and eventually new multifamily inventory over the next several years. That’s a market shift worth flagging to buyers and sellers well before the cranes actually show up.

What’s driving it

Two forces are pulling development in opposite directions at the same time, and it helps to understand both.

The MBTA Communities Act effectively took the decision out of individual zoning boards’ hands. Cities and towns served by the T are now required to zone by-right for multifamily housing near transit stops, meaning a qualifying project doesn’t have to survive the kind of case-by-case local approval fight that used to be able to stall or kill it. That’s a direct legal mandate, not a market trend, which is part of why the suburban pipeline is growing even in a higher-cost building environment.

Meanwhile, the same cost and financing pressure weighing on Boston’s approval numbers is likely making lower-rise suburban multifamily projects pencil out better than large urban towers right now. Land costs less outside the core, and a mid-size project is generally less exposed to the kind of financing risk that’s been sidelining bigger downtown developments. None of that shows up as a clean, single statistic, but it’s the practical backdrop behind why growth is shifting geographically rather than simply slowing everywhere at once.

The other side of growth: What active construction means for nearby properties

Growth like this is generally good for a market, but it changes the day-to-day experience of living near it, and that’s worth building into how agents handle a nearby listing.

A project rising down the block usually means:

• An extended stretch of construction noise and dust during work hours
• Temporary loss of street parking and added truck traffic
• Sidewalk or lane closures that can complicate a commute or an open house scheduled at the wrong time of day
• A timeline that’s hard to pin down — a permitted project can sit for a long stretch before it’s actually under construction, so buyers shouldn’t assume a nearby site will resolve on any particular schedule
• Longer-term questions worth raising proactively with buyers, like how a pending project might affect a block’s feel, sightlines or sunlight down the road, rather than letting them find out after closing
• More construction activity also means more construction accidents. Construction accounted for more fatal occupational injuries than any other industry in Massachusetts in 2023, 37 out of 111 statewide, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Jason Stone Injury Lawyer’s attorneys note that liability disputes in these cases usually play out between employees, contractors and insurers, but nearby residents, drivers and pedestrians can end up affected too, so the impact of a single site can reach further than it first appears. Though, in practice, these incidents remain rare.

Property damage is part of the risk too

Injury isn’t the only thing worth watching for. Heavy excavation, pile driving and demolition work next door can also cause real property damage to neighboring buildings. Cracked foundations, settling or vibration damage are among the most common complaints, which can turn into its own insurance and liability headache for whoever owns the affected property. It’s worth keeping in mind alongside the personal-injury side, especially for agents working with sellers whose property sits close to an active or upcoming site.

What this means for agents

None of this is a reason to steer clients away from up-and-coming neighborhoods or towns on the MBTA Communities list. It’s a reason to build a few extra habits into how a listing near active construction gets handled: checking whether there are open permits nearby before a showing, giving buyers a heads-up on the disruptions above and being upfront that construction-related noise, dust or access changes are temporary rather than permanent features of the property.

And if a client or colleague is ever actually injured or their property damaged near a construction site, it’s worth knowing that the question of who’s responsible usually needs a closer look than it appears at first glance. Firms that regularly handle construction and premises injury cases across Massachusetts, including Jason Stone Injury Lawyer, generally recommend documenting the scene and getting a professional opinion early, since the facts around liability can shift quickly once a site changes.