Construction Costs Compared

Costs and prices. The construction cost index for residential building and housing estates rose from the annual average of 2018 (98.1) to the annual average of 2025 (130.2) by 32.7% (2020 = 100). For July 2026 Statistics Austria provisionally reports 105.5 on the new base 2025 = 100 (+5.2% on July 2025); chained to the old base that is 137.4, and thus +40.1% on the annual average of 2018 (own calculation). The construction price index rose from 100.0 (2020) to 136.3 (2025), that is +36.3%. According to the standard documentation of Statistics Austria both indices are without VAT (card “With or without VAT”).

Until 2020 costs rose by 2.9%, 1.1% and 0.9% a year. In 2021 and 2022 came +10.4% and +10.1%, then +1.1%, +3.6% and +2.3%. Prices followed later and more strongly than costs: +8.0% (2021), +15.0% (2022), +7.5% (2023), then +1.3% and +0.8%. From 2020 to 2025 prices rose by 36.3%, costs by 30.2% (own calculation). Why prices rose more than costs, the figures do not say; the firm’s margin is measured by neither index.

Annual averages. * July 2026: provisional value 105.5 (2025 = 100) times the annual average of 2025 (130.2), own calculation; the change is the rate Statistics Austria reports on July 2025. Construction cost index 2018 and 2019: converted from the series with base 1990 (own calculation), 2020 to 2025 published; annual rates of the cost index from the WKO yearbook (base 1990). Construction price index 2018 and 2019: not published on base 2020 (·). Construction price index 2023 (+7.5%): own calculation from 133.5 and 124.2; 2024 and 2025 according to Statistics Austria. Provisional values: the annual average 2025 of the construction cost index (130.2) carries the note “vorläufige Werte” (provisional values) in the report of December 2025; the value for 2022 (121.6) is the value of the December 2022 edition, which was also marked provisional there (a later final version was not read). Limited comparability: for the construction price index, 2020 was converted from base 2015 to base 2020; according to the press release of 10 February 2022 the comparison of 2020 with 2021 is possible only to a limited extent because of different baskets and weights.

How to read this. The page this chapter starts from describes “two waves”: first the material shock of 2021 and 2022, then the wage wave from 2023. The published sub-indices are compatible with that: the construction cost index rose by 10.4% and 10.1% in 2021 and 2022; over these two years the sub-index other costs (everything except labour) rose to 137.5 (+37.5% on 2020) and the sub-index labour to 105.1 (+5.1%). From 2023 to 2025 labour rose by 12.6% and other costs by 0.5% (tab “Labour against materials”). No cause follows from that: other costs comprise more than materials. The construction cost index covers the whole of housing, not only the shell (card “What the indices measure”).

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: Construction costs +40% since 2018; Shell or residential building; Two waves.

Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2023; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2022; Statistics Austria, topic page construction price index; ORF.at, construction prices 2024; vol.at, construction prices 2023; leadersnet.at, construction prices 2022; vol.at, construction prices 2021; Statistics Austria, press conference on housing 2023; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

The five series this chapter places side by side do not measure the same thing. The table says what each measures; it is the key to all comparisons in the chapter.

Classification. What the series have in common is housing and the idea of valuing an unchanged basket of construction work over time. They differ in subject (costs against prices), VAT and timing. The consequence: the series may be compared as to direction and approximate size, not to the decimal place. For the comparison the chapter converts to a common base year and says so each time.

Statement of the source page on this topic, with rating: Costs and prices.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); Destatis, topic page construction prices; teraz.sk, construction work June 2026; CEIC, Slovak construction price index; Finančná správa, VAT rates; Eurostat, Statistics Explained, construction price and cost indices; Eurostat, metadata construction prices and costs; Eurostat sts_copi_a (via DBnomics). The full references are in the sources block below.

All series converted to the annual average of 2021 = 100. From this one can read by how much building became dearer from 2021 to 2025 in each case: in Austria by 26.2% according to the construction price index (by 17.9% according to the cost index), in Germany by 33.9%, in the EU by 24.3% and in Slovakia by 46.4%. Slovakia leads, Germany follows, the Austrian construction prices and the EU lie close together; the gap between Slovakia and the Austrian construction prices is 20.2 pp.

Annual averages, 2021 = 100. Austria: series with base 2020, divided by the 2021 value. Germany: published (base 2021). Slovakia and EU-27: chained from the annual rates 2022 to 2025 (own calculation); the Slovak chain rests on press reports, the EU chain agrees to 0.1 points with the index values of a secondary source (IndexBox: 122.6 for 2024 and 124.2 for 2025).

How to read this. Three things limit the comparison. First, VAT: the German index includes it, the Austrian one does not; a change in the tax rate shifts the German index without construction work becoming dearer (example 2020, card “Germany”); we did not specifically check whether the rate changed from 2021 to 2025. Second, the subject: the Slovak rate concerns construction works as a whole, not only housing. Third, the base year: with 2021 the comparison starts after the first rises of 2021 (card “Take care when comparing” in the tab “Overview”). The value “2025” is in each case the annual average.

Summarising statement on this topic (not in this form on the source page), with rating: A third dearer.

Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; Eurostat, news of 25 June 2026; IndexBox, construction prices of new residential buildings; Brussels Times, construction costs in the EU. The full references are in the sources block below.

How fast did prices rise in the individual years? 2022 was the year of the strongest price rise in all four areas (+15.0% Austria, +16.3% Germany, +18.3% Slovakia, +12.2% EU); afterwards the rise flattened, least in Slovakia (+5.3% in 2025, Austria +0.8%, EU +1.3%). Austria’s construction prices rose by 1.3% in 2024 and 0.8% in 2025.

Change of the annual average on the previous year. Germany 2021: rate of the first publication on base 2015 (+9.1%), the rates from 2022 come from the series with base 2021; for 2022 Destatis gives +16.4% in the first publication, the series with base 2021 +16.3%. Slovakia: 2022 and 2023 are called “cumulative”, 2025 is identical to the December value (see card “Slovakia”).

Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022; Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; Eurostat, news of 25 June 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

Anyone who wants to know whether building became dearer relative to everything else compares construction prices with consumer prices. From 2021 to 2025 construction prices in Austria rose by 26.2%, consumer prices by 24.8%: a difference of +1.4 pp. In the EU the difference is +2.1 pp, in Germany +15.7 pp. There construction prices thus rose markedly more than consumer prices. For Slovakia we found consumer prices only to 2023 (2022: 12.1%, 2023: 11.0%), so the comparison stays open.

Own calculation: annual rates 2022 to 2025 chained multiplicatively. Austria and Germany: national consumer price index (Austria 8.6, 7.8, 2.9, 3.6, Germany 6.9, 5.9, 2.2, 2.2), EU-27: harmonised index (HICP: 9.2, 6.4, 2.6, 2.5). The difference is given in percentage points. Consumer prices are no measure of the other prices a client pays; they are a customary yardstick.

How to read this. A positive difference means that building became dearer faster than the consumers’ basket in the period. The measure depends on the period: for Austria’s construction cost index from 2018 to 2025 the rise (+32.7%) lies just below that of consumer prices (+34.7%, own calculation).

Summarising statement on this topic (not in this form on the source page), with rating: Dearer than consumer prices.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; WKO, statistical yearbook, consumer price index; Destatis, inflation rate 2025; Destatis, table consumer price index (vpi001j); CBS, HICP euro area and EU; Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 January 2026; WIFO, table 1.4 consumer prices; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; Eurostat, news of 25 June 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

How does 2026 go on? In Austria the annual rate of the construction cost index rose from +1.8% in January to +5.7% in September (peak +5.9% in May); in Germany from +3.3% in February via +5.0% in May to +5.5% in August; in Slovakia the prices of construction works were +5.1% above the previous year in April and +6.1% in June (annual values 2024 and 2025: +5.4% and +5.3%). The August value for Germany is the highest comparison with the previous year since the reporting month of August 2023 (+6.3%, own calculation from the index values of the Destatis table); the peak for Austria in May (+5.9%) lies above the December value of 2022 (+5.8%). For the EU we found no value for 2026.

Change on the same month of the previous year. Austria: monthly values of the construction cost index, residential total, from the OeNB table (data as of 17 October 2026, read identically in two queries); the Statistics Austria press release gave +5.2% for July provisionally, the table +5.2%. Germany: reporting months February, May, August. Slovakia: monthly rates for April and June (January to April together: +4.9%, January to June: +5.2%).

How to read this. The rates are changes on the same month of the previous year and thus contain base effects: a low comparison value a year earlier raises the rate. The monthly values for Austria are provisional. Whether a new surge in prices begins in 2026 or whether this stays a blip, the figures do not say; the chapter gives no forecast.

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: In 2026 costs are rising again; Highest rise since 2022.

Evidence. OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; TASR, construction work April 2026; teraz.sk, construction work June 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

Prices including VAT. With the construction price index Destatis measures the prices for construction work on the building (new build, conventional construction) including VAT; they are prices and not the client’s total costs. The index rose by 33.9% from 2021 to 2025; in August 2026 it stands at 141.7 (+5.5% on August 2025). The series before 2021 was published on a different base (2015 = 100) and has not been converted to 2021; chained (own calculation) it gives a rise of 54.8% for 2018 to 2025.

The VAT cut of 2020. From July to December 2020 the tax rate was lowered. Because the index measures prices including tax, the comparison with the previous year fell to −0.1% in November 2020, the first decline since February 2002; for the case without the cut Destatis gives +2.5% as a calculation. In November 2021 the effect reversed: +14.4% was reported, +11.6% as a calculation without the cut in the previous year. +14.4% in November 2021 was, according to Destatis, the largest rise since August 1970 (+17.0%); in May 2022 the rate reached its peak in the current series with +17.4%.

How to read this. The rates “19 to 16 per cent” and the exact period are not in the text of the press release we read (only “since July 2020”); we therefore do not give them as a measurement. A further note: the Destatis table will no longer be updated from calendar week 43/2026 and will be switched off in early 2027.

Evidence. Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; Destatis, topic page construction prices; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2020; Destatis, press release of 8 January 2021; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022; Destatis, press release of 10 July 2026; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

Prices of construction works and of building materials. The Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic (ŠÚ SR) publishes monthly the prices of construction works (“ceny stavebných prác”) and of materials used in construction; we read the figures in press reports (TASR, SITA, teraz.sk, ASB.sk, Standard.sk), not on the office’s own pages (two retrievals from its pages were not allowed and were not circumvented). The prices of construction works rose by 3.8% in 2021, 18.3% in 2022, 11.5% in 2023, 5.4% in 2024 and 5.3% in 2025; building materials by 11.6% in 2021, 22.9% in 2022, then 3.4% (2023), −0.6% (2024) and 2.7% (2025).

A secondary source (CEIC, with ŠÚ SR as the source) gives index levels with base 2021 = 100 for residential buildings: 87.1 in Q1 2018 and 147.2 in Q1 2025, a rise of 69.0% (own calculation). The index of construction works as a whole reached, accordingly, its highest value of the series in March 2025 with 146.4, that of building materials in March 2023 with 130.1.

How to read this. Three points before use: the 2025 value (5.3%) is the same as the December value and may have been mixed up in the summary; the 2023 value (11.5%) came without a verbatim sentence; the annual values for 2022 and 2023 are called “cumulative”, not expressly “annual average”. Whether the prices include VAT (normal rate 23 per cent since 1 January 2025) is not stated anywhere. We found nothing for the annual values 2018 to 2020.

Evidence. ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; TASR, construction work April 2026; teraz.sk, construction work June 2026; TASR, construction work April 2023; CEIC, Slovak construction price index; Finančná správa, VAT rates. The full references are in the sources block below.

Eurostat: new residential buildings in the EU. Eurostat publishes indices for construction prices and costs of new residential buildings (without residences for communities) for the member states and a value for the EU-27. The news item of 25 June 2026 gives a rise of 48.2% for the EU-27 from 2015 to 2025, the annual rates are in the table; after the peak in 2022 (+12.2%) the rise weakened to 2025 (+1.3%). Chained (own calculation) the index stands at 124.3 in 2025 (2021 = 100).

The country series at Eurostat. In the Eurostat table teiis510 (costs, building type “Residential buildings, except residences for communities”, index 2021 = 100) cost indices stand for Austria and Germany: Austria 118.4 in Q4 2025 and Germany 121.9 in Q3 2025 (data as of 16 January 2026; the series from sts_copi_q on base 2015 end in 2023). The Austrian value fits the construction cost index (117.9 as annual average 2025). The German one lies 12 points below the Destatis construction price index (134.3 in August 2025). For Germany Eurostat and Destatis evidently do not measure the same thing; what the difference consists of, the pages we read do not say (card “Where figures contradict each other”).

How to read this. For Slovakia and for the EU-27 nothing was legible in the database extracts; the EU figure comes from the Eurostat news item of 25 June 2026 (parts of the full text), the annual rates and the ten-year rise agree with two secondary sources. Whether the EU figures include VAT and how price and cost series are mixed in the EU figure is not stated in the texts we read. In this chapter “Europe” means the EU-27.

Evidence. Eurostat, news of 25 June 2026; Brussels Times, construction costs in the EU; IndexBox, construction prices of new residential buildings; Eurostat sts_copi_a (via DBnomics); Eurostat sts_copi_q (via DBnomics); Eurostat teiis510 (via DBnomics); Eurostat, Statistics Explained, construction price and cost indices; Eurostat, metadata construction prices and costs. The full references are in the sources block below.

Labour and other costs. Statistics Austria publishes the construction cost index for residential building and housing estates in two sub-indices: labour and other costs (“Sonstiges”), that is the costs except labour, for example building materials, energy, transport and equipment. In the base year 2020 wages entered the overall index with a weight of 49.13%. The first wave is in other costs: by 2022 other costs had risen to 137.5 (+37.5% on 2020), labour only to 105.1 (+5.1%). In 2023 other costs fell to 133.0 (−3.3% on the previous year) while labour rose to 112.5 (+7.0%). From 2023 to 2025 other costs stayed almost the same (133.6, +0.5%), labour rose to 126.7 (+12.6%). The gap between the sub-indices thus grew from zero (2020) to 32.4 points (2022), stood at 20.5 in 2023 and fell to 6.9 points by 2025.

Annual averages, residential building and housing estates, total construction costs; overall index according to Statistics Austria. Sources: report SB 2-12 of December 2022 (2021, 2022), of December 2024 (2023) and of December 2025 (2024, 2025). * Marked provisional in the report; for 2022 a later final version was not read. The report of December 2022 contains two tables with different values for 2021 and 2022; the text extract we read does not assign the headings unambiguously. The first table (total construction costs) is used because it agrees with the press release of 13 January 2023 (121.6 in 2022) and with the rates for 2023 in the report of December 2024 (labour +7.0%, other costs −3.3%, overall +1.1%). The second table gives labour 102.3, other costs 117.0, overall 109.4 for 2021 and 105.5, 138.2 and 121.4 for 2022.

How much of the rise falls on labour, how much on other costs? (own calculation)

The overall index is the sum of the two sub-indices weighted with the base weights; for 2021 to 2025 that holds to 0.1 points. From this one can read how many index points of the rise fall on labour and on other costs. From 2020 to 2022 the overall index rose by 21.6 points, of which 19.1 points (88%) fell on other costs. In 2023 it rose by only 1.3 points: labour contributed 3.6 points, other costs −2.3. From 2023 to 2025 it was 7.3 points, of which 7.0 on labour (96%). Over the whole five years from 2020 to 2025 (30.2 points) 17.1 points fall on other costs and 13.1 on labour (43%). The sequence is thus visible in the index: other costs first, then labour.

Own calculation: contribution of labour = weight (49.13%) times change of the sub-index labour; contribution of other costs = (1 minus weight) times change of other costs. The sum of the two contributions deviates from the published rise by 0.1 points at most (rounding).

Master-builder work and 2026

For master-builder work alone, which the source page takes to be the classic shell, Statistics Austria gives for 2025: labour 127.1, other costs 135.2, overall 131.1 (2020 = 100). The gap between other costs and labour is 8.1 points, somewhat larger than in housing as a whole (6.9). For 2026 we found no split into labour and other costs. The overall index (base 2025 = 100) rose by 1.5% in March, 1.5% in April and 2.2% in May on the previous month; the collective agreement for construction raises the minimum wages from 1 May (+3.6%). What triggered the rise in March and April, the figures do not show (own calculation from rounded monthly values, accuracy about 0.1 percentage points).

How to read this. Three things limit the statement. First: the values for 2022 and 2025 are marked provisional in the respective report; for 2022 we read no later final version, and the edition of December 2022 contains two tables with different values (see footnote). Second: “other costs” is a collective term. A rise in other costs is not the same as a rise in building-material prices; the tabs “Price shock” and “Basket of goods” show what it contains. Third: the sub-indices measure the firm’s costs, not its prices and not its profit; why the share of labour in the rise grew, they do not say.

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: Other costs frozen since 2023; Wages catch up; Master-builder work alone; Labour is the real driver.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022); Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); WKO, collective agreement construction 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

Shell against finishing. Destatis publishes the construction price index by type of work, not by labour and materials. A compilation by the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen with data of the Federal Statistical Office combines them into shell work and finishing work (2021 = 100). By 2025 shell work had risen to 127.4 (+27.4%), finishing work to 139.0 (+39.0%); the construction price index as a whole to 133.9 (+33.9%). In the first year, 2022, the two were level (+16.3% and +16.4%); afterwards finishing pulled away. The delimitation of “shell” is not the same as on the Austrian source page (there excavation, concrete, masonry, sealing and development count as shell in the narrower sense); how roofing and carpentry are assigned in Germany we have not checked.

Annual averages, new residential buildings, conventional construction, including VAT. Change 2022: on the base year 2021 (= 100). The rates for 2023 to 2025 are own calculation from the index values.

Building materials and wages side by side, 2021 and 2022

For individual building materials Destatis reports the producer prices, that is the prices at which manufacturers sell, not the prices a client pays. In the annual average of 2021 the producer prices of reinforcing mesh were +52.8% above the previous year (reinforcing steel in bars: +53.2%), those of structural timber +77.3% and of bitumen +36.1%; in 2022 reinforcing mesh rose by 38.1% (bar steel: 40.4%), bitumen by 38.5% and diesel by 41.6%, while structural timber fell by 11.9%. The collectively agreed wage of group 4 (West) was +2.1% above the previous year on 1 January 2021 and +2.0% on 1 January 2022. Plausibility check: the construction price index rose by 16.3% in 2022. The agreed wage rose by 4.3% from January 2021 to January 2023 taken together; even with a weight of 100 per cent the contribution of the agreed wages would lie below the rise of 2022. Whether actual wages (overtime, allowances) rose more than the agreed rates, the sources we read do not show. Reinforcing steel in bars (2021) and bar steel (2022) are different products, each named by Destatis in only one of the two press releases; we do not chain them.

Building materials: producer prices of industrial products, annual average on the previous year (Destatis, press releases of 10 February 2022 and 1 February 2023); the value for both years is not available for every material (·). Collectively agreed wage: total hourly wage of wage group 4 (standard wage with 5.9% surcharge), as at 1 January, change on 1 January of the previous year; the points of measurement are not the same as for the annual averages of the materials.

How to read this. German sources do not allow the construction price index to be split into labour and materials; the table puts two different things side by side, producer prices of individual materials and a collectively agreed wage. It shows two things. First, in 2021 all six materials named and in 2022 five of seven (including diesel) rose at least nine times as fast as the agreed wage, while structural timber fell in 2022 and construction timber hardly rose. Second, the agreed wage went up by 7.5% on 1 January 2025 (as at 1 January 2024: €22.40/h, 2025: €24.07/h). We have not read a weight of wages in the German construction price index; building-material prices after 2022 are not available to us.

Evidence. Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); Destatis, building materials 2021; Destatis, building materials 2022; HDB, wages and pay in the construction trade; Deutsche Handwerks Zeitung, construction wage settlement 2025; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

Construction works against building materials. The Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic reports the prices of construction works and the prices of building materials separately (press reports). In 2021 and 2022 building materials rose faster than construction works (difference −7.8 pp and −4.6 pp), in 2023 to 2025 construction works rose faster (+8.1 pp, +6.0 pp, +2.6 pp); in the first four months of 2026 materials were narrowly ahead again (−0.7 pp). Chained over 2021 to 2025, construction works rose by 52.0%, building materials by 44.8% (own calculation).

Change of the annual averages on the previous year; January to April 2026 on the same period of the previous year. The differences in percentage points and the chained rows are own calculation. The 2025 value for construction works (5.3%) is the same as the December value; the 2023 value (11.5%) came without a verbatim sentence; 2022 and 2023 are called “cumulative” (card “Slovakia” in the tab “Overall”).

How to read this. The pattern resembles the Austrian one: materials ahead first, then construction works. It is comparable only in direction. Slovakia has no split of construction works into labour and other costs; whether building materials are part of the price index of construction works is not stated in the reports we read. We have no wage index for the construction sector, only the average monthly wage of 2023 (card “Slovakia” in the tab “Wages”). No cause for the change in ranking follows from the figures.

Evidence. ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; TASR, construction work April 2026; teraz.sk, construction work June 2026; CEIC, Slovak construction price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

The four areas cannot be equated figure by figure on the question “labour or materials”, but the direction of the series is similar: where materials and wages are available separately (Austria, Slovakia, in approximations Germany), the material-related variables rose earlier (in Austria, Germany and Slovakia in 2021 and 2022), the wage-related ones later. That is a pattern in the figures and not an explanation; “materials” and “labour” are defined differently in each area.

How to read this. What the tab does not show: how much labour and materials actually cost per building project (that depends on type of construction, specification and region), and whether higher wages later led to higher prices or the other way round. The indices do not measure such relations.

Summarising statement on this topic (not in this form on the source page), with rating: Wages drive costs everywhere.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; Destatis, building materials 2022; HDB, wages and pay in the construction trade; ASB.sk, construction work 2021; TASR, construction work 2025; Eurostat, Statistics Explained, construction price and cost indices; Eurostat, metadata construction prices and costs. The full references are in the sources block below.

How the minimum wages rise. The collective agreement for workers in the construction trade and industry raises the minimum wages every year on 1 May. From 2019 to 2026 the eight increases chained give +40.8% (own calculation); the minimum hourly wage of a skilled worker (wage group II.b) rose from €14.20 (2018, back-calculated from the rates) to €19.99 from 1 May 2026. The amount is mostly calculated from inflation: in six of the eight years the texts we read give the calculation from the consumer price index (2020 and 2022 to 2026), in 2021 the rate was fixed, for 2019 we read no formula. A surcharge on inflation applied in 2020 (0.95 pp), 2022 (0.70 pp) and 2024 (0.35 pp), none in 2023, 2025 and 2026. Where the reference period of the inflation is stated (2020 and 2023 to 2026), it ends before the increase; for 2026 it is the whole calendar year 2025.

* Own calculation: previous year’s value times (1 plus rate), rounded to the cent; 2020, 2022, 2024, 2025 and 2026 were read. The source page shows 16.01 and 17.53 for 2022 and 2023; the published value for 2022 is €16.02, the calculated value for 2023 €17.54. The 2025 value (€19.30) is on the WKO page “Lohnordnung Bau 2025” (wage scale for construction 2025; the page on the 2025 collective agreement gives no hourly wage) and fits the 2024 and 2026 values arithmetically. The scale is called “Lohnordnung” there; “Facharbeiter” (skilled worker) is the heading of group II with rows a) and b). Minimum wage under the collective agreement, not the wage actually paid.

Increase against inflation: in the same year or the year before?

The source page writes that the inflation of the previous year counts and that wages therefore lag inflation by a year; as evidence it gives, for 2022, inflation of 8.6% and a wage increase of 4.2%. The 8.6% is, however, the inflation of 2022 itself; in the previous year, 2021, it was 2.8%, and the increase of 4.20% was 1.40 pp above it. The table puts both comparisons side by side: against the inflation of the same calendar year the increases lie between −4.40 pp (2022) and +4.25 pp (2024), against the inflation of the previous year, in all eight years, between −0.65 pp and +1.40 pp. On average over 2019 to 2025 the gap (without sign) to the inflation of the same year is 2.14 pp, to the inflation of the previous year 0.89 pp. That fits the formulas: the increase on 1 May builds on the inflation of the months before. In 2022 the increase stayed 4.40 pp below the inflation of the year, in 2023 and 2024 it was 1.70 pp and 4.25 pp above (own calculation).

Consumer price index (CPI), annual average on the previous year. Differences in percentage points (own calculation). No annual value of inflation is available for 2026.

How much more than inflation? Five windows (own calculation)

The source page gives +40.8% for wages and +32.0% for inflation. Both figures are correct, but the periods are not equally long: wages comprise eight increases (2019 to 2026), inflation seven annual rates (2019 to 2025). For the same years (2019 to 2025) it is +35.9% against +32.0%, a gap of 3.8 pp instead of 8.7 pp; for the same number with inflation moved forward (2018 to 2025) +40.8% against +34.7%, a gap of 6.1 pp. In real terms, that is after deducting inflation, the skilled worker’s minimum wage rose by 2.9% for the same years and by 4.5% with inflation moved forward. The larger part of the gap arose before 2022: in 2019 to 2021 wages rose by 8.2%, prices by 5.8%.

Own calculation: rates or annual rates chained multiplicatively, differences from the unrounded values (they can deviate from the difference of the rounded figures by 0.1). Consumer prices: annual average of Statistics Austria, increases: each from 1 May; the points in time do not coincide.

How to read this. Four limitations. First: these are minimum wages. For wages actually paid the collective-agreement page names a parallel-shift clause for 2025; how it works we have not read. Second: special payments, non-wage costs and surcharges come on top of the hourly wage; the cost per working hour for the firm is therefore higher (for the Austrian construction sector we found no figure in euros, see card “Labour costs”). Third: the source page writes that the formula has been linked to inflation “since 2020”; that holds with exceptions (2021 a fixed rate, a surcharge in only three years). Fourth: the collective agreement for workers in construction is a sector agreement and says nothing about salaried employees, subcontractors and posted workers.

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: Formula linked to inflation; Wages lag behind inflation; Catch-up effect in 2023 and 2024; Skilled worker €14.20 and €19.99; Labour component +8.1% and +4.2%; Cost per hour worked is higher; Actual wages by parallel shift.

Evidence. WKO, collective agreement construction 2019; WKO, collective agreement construction 2020; WKO, collective agreement construction 2021; WKO, collective agreement construction result 2021; WKO, collective agreement construction 2022; WKO, collective agreement construction 2023; WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; WKO, collective agreement construction 2024; WKO, collective agreement construction new agreement 2024; WKO, wage order construction 2024; WKO, collective agreement construction 2025; WKO, wage order construction 2025; WKO, collective agreement construction 2026; Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; WKO, statistical yearbook, consumer price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

Agreed wage. The total hourly wage of wage group 4 (standard wage, including a 5.9% surcharge) in the construction industry was €19.51 (West) and €18.15 (East) on 1 January 2018, and €24.07 and €23.56 on 1 January 2025: +23.4% and +29.8% (own calculation). The table of the Federal Association of the German Construction Industry ends with the position on 1 January 2025. The 2024 wage agreement has three steps: on 1 May 2024 +1.2% in the West and +2.2% in the East, plus €230 a month for all groups; on 1 April 2025 +4.2% (West) and +5.0% (East); on 1 April 2026 +3.9% in the West, in the East alignment to the western level (percentage not stated). The term is three years from 1 April 2024 (according to the Deutsche Handwerks Zeitung).

Agreed wage: total hourly wage of wage group 4 (gross, without employer contributions), position at the beginning of the year; the step of 1 May 2024 is included in the 2025 value, that of 1 April 2025 is not. Change on the previous year’s position (own calculation). Minimum wage: position on 1 January; the 2018 value has applied since 1 January 2017; for 2023 the value applies that has been in force since 1 October 2022 (no entry of its own in the source). In 2022 there were three steps: €9.82 in January, €10.45 in July, €12.00 in October.

Minimum wage. The statutory minimum wage rose from €8.84 (2018) to €13.90 (2026), that is +57.2%; for 2027 the ministry’s table “Bisher festgesetzte Mindestlöhne” (minimum wages set so far) lists €14.60 (from 1 January 2027; the row names no legal basis). The big jump was October 2022 (€12.00 instead of €9.82 in January, +22.2%). The agreed wage of group 4 (West) was 1.88 times the statutory minimum wage on 1 January 2025. A generally binding sector minimum wage for the main construction trade last applied, according to a private, undated page, until the end of 2021 (May to December 2021: €12.85 minimum wage 1, €15.70 minimum wage 2 in the West); since then the statutory minimum wage has applied. Whether that holds unchanged for 2023 to 2026 we have not checked.

How to read this. The standard wage is an agreed wage, not average earnings. Because the table shows the position on 1 January, the steps appear with a delay: the jump of 7.5% between 2024 and 2025 includes the step of May 2024, not that of April 2025. That the standard wage in Germany (West €24.07 in January 2025) is higher than the skilled worker’s minimum wage in Austria (€19.30 from May 2025) is no comparison of costs: the groups are delimited differently, the German values contain a surcharge of 5.9%, and the labour costs per hour (card “Labour costs”) include non-wage costs on top.

Evidence. HDB, wages and pay in the construction trade; Deutsche Handwerks Zeitung, construction wage settlement 2025; BMAS, statutory minimum wage; lohn-info.de, minimum wage main construction trade. The full references are in the sources block below.

Minimum wage. The statutory minimum wage in Slovakia rose from €480 a month (2018) to €915 (2026), that is +90.6%; per hour from €2.759 to €5.259. From 2025 to 2026 the rise is +12.1%. The minimum wage applies to all sectors; it is not a wage of the construction sector. For 2027 notice 232/2026 of 23 September 2026 (Slov-Lex) gives €972 a month (€5.586 per hour); the ministry’s page gives only 2025 and 2026.

Wages in construction. For the average wage in construction we found only one figure: in 2023 the average there was €1,025 a month, in December €1,064, in industry €1,511 (figures marked as provisional, according to a specialist portal of 28 February 2024). That is 67.8% of the industrial wage (own calculation). We found no series for other years. For the labour cost index in construction Eurostat gives a rise of 7.4% on the same quarter of the previous year for Q4 2025 (card “Labour costs”).

How to read this. The minimum wage shows how the lower end of wages developed; it says nothing about what construction workers actually earn. The 2023 value (construction) comes from a report of a specialist portal in which the figures are marked as provisional; the text we read does not expressly name the body that collected them, and the delimitation (size of firm, gross) is not stated. A secondary source (Trading Economics) gives a rise of the labour cost index in construction of +6.5% for March 2026; definition and base are not stated there, and the figure could not be checked against a primary source (the page blocks further retrievals).

Evidence. IZ, development of the minimum wage; Slov-Lex, minimum wage 2027 (notice 232/2026); MPSVR, minimum wage amounts; pracovnepravo.sk, wages by sector 2023; Trading Economics, labour cost index construction Slovakia. The full references are in the sources block below.

What a working hour costs. Eurostat and the national offices estimate the labour costs per hour worked for 2025, that is gross earnings plus non-wage costs. In the economy as a whole an hour cost €46.30 in Austria, €45.00 in Germany, €34.90 on EU-27 average and €19.80 in Slovakia. Austria was thus 32.7% above the EU average, Germany 28.9%, Slovakia 43.3% below; an hour in Austria was 2.3 times the Slovak one. In construction Eurostat gives €31.5 on EU-27 average and €34.4 in the euro area for 2025 (2024: €30.0 and €33.4). For Germany Destatis estimates construction at €39.6 per hour (2020: €31.2, +26.9%); that is 25.7% above the EU-27 value for construction (own calculation; Destatis gives 26 per cent). For Austria and Slovakia we read no euro values for construction, only rates of change.

Labour costs per hour worked 2025, estimate (Eurostat, Destatis). Whole economy and industry: country values according to the Europe page of Destatis; construction: EU-27 and euro area according to Eurostat, Germany according to Destatis (annual estimate, extrapolated from the 2020 survey; the EU average 2025 is calculated there without Belgium). Scope: the country values are on the Europe page of Destatis in the column “B to N Business economy”; Eurostat calls the same EU value (€34.9) “whole economy” in its news item of 31 March 2026 and defines that as all economic activities except agriculture, forestry and fishing, public administration and social security, households as employers and extraterritorial organisations (sections A, O, T and U). The label thus differs by page. Euro area: the news item of 2025 used 20 countries (Bulgaria adopted the euro on 1 January 2026), the news item of 2026 uses the current composition with Bulgaria for the whole economy; for construction the extract we read does not say. The euro-area values 2024 and 2025 are therefore not strictly comparable, the EU-27 values are. Gap to the EU-27 value: own calculation. A survey for 2024 had been announced for July 2026; we did not find results.

How fast do labour costs in construction rise? Labour cost index, change on the same quarter of the previous year

In Q4 2025 the labour costs per hour in construction were +4.5% above the previous year’s quarter in Austria, +3.7% in Germany, +7.4% in Slovakia and +4.5% in the EU-27. Slovakia was ahead in all three quarters of the table (+10.2%, +6.0%, +7.4%). Austria’s rate in Q4 2024 (+8.2%) was markedly higher than a year later; non-wage costs rose by 15.3% then, wages by 6.2%. Why, the tables do not say.

Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 March 2026, table “Nominal hourly labour costs of Construction”, calendar adjusted (columns total, wages and salaries, non-wage costs). All values agree with a second retrieval. They are rates of change, not levels.

How to read this. Two things must not be confused: the euro values above are levels and estimates for 2025, the quarterly rates are changes on the previous year. A country with a high rate and a low level (Slovakia) catches up without reaching the level of the others. The hourly costs of the economy as a whole are 2.3 times the Slovak ones in Austria and 2.3 times in Germany. Whether that gap shows up in building costs, no index we read shows; Eurostat gives the price level of construction work for Germany as 145 (EU = 100, 2024), for Austria and Slovakia we did not read it.

Evidence. Destatis, hourly labour costs in the EU; Eurostat, Statistics Explained, hourly labour costs; Eurostat, news of 28 March 2025; Eurostat, news of 31 March 2026; Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 March 2026; Destatis, labour costs 2025; Eurostat, Statistics Explained, price levels of investment. The full references are in the sources block below.

Whether higher wages mean more purchasing power depends on inflation. The table shows the harmonised index of consumer prices (HICP), which is calculated comparably across the EU. In 2022 inflation was highest in Slovakia at 12.1%, in Austria 8.6%, in Germany 8.7%; in December 2025 it was again highest in Slovakia at 4.1%, in Austria 3.8%, in Germany 2.0%, in the EU-27 2.3%. Chained from 2021 to 2025, consumer prices rose by 24.7% in Austria and 22.2% in the EU-27 (HICP, own calculation); Germany has no value for 2024 in the HICP extract (the national index gives +18.2% from 2021 to 2025), Slovakia none for 2024 and 2025.

HICP, change on the previous year in per cent (annual average; last row: monthly rate). Austria 2024 and Germany 2025 from database mirrors (secondary source), 2021 to 2023 from a WIFO table, EU-27 2024 and 2025 from the Dutch statistics office. · = not found. The national consumer price index of Austria (CPI) deviates by 0.1 percentage points for 2023 (7.8 instead of 7.7).

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: 2022: inflation 8.6%, wages +4.2%; Wages +40.8%, inflation +32.0%.

Evidence. WIFO, table 1.4 consumer prices; CBS, HICP euro area and EU; ECB ICP via DBnomics, Austria; Eurostat tec00118 via DBnomics, Germany; Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 January 2026; Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; Destatis, inflation rate 2025; Destatis, table consumer price index (vpi001j). The full references are in the sources block below.

The four areas have no common wage series for building; the table puts side by side what exists. In Austria the skilled worker’s minimum wage rose by 25.6% from May 2021 to May 2025, consumer prices (2022 to 2025) by 24.8%: wages and prices ran about level. In Germany the standard wage West (position in January) rose by 14.3%, consumer prices by 18.2%; the step of April 2025 (+4.2%) is not yet included in that figure. In Slovakia the minimum wage rose by 31.0%, a comparison with consumer prices is missing. Labour costs per hour in construction rose fastest in Slovakia in Q4 2025 on the previous year (+7.4%), equally fast in Austria and the EU-27 (+4.5%), slowest in Germany (+3.7%).

How to read this. The wage series are not comparable: Austria shows a minimum wage of the building trades, Germany an agreed wage at a reference date, Slovakia a minimum wage for all sectors. The points in time differ (May, January, year). The last two columns measure something other than the wage series: labour costs including non-wage costs, in construction (index) and in the economy as a whole (level). A statement of the kind “in country X wages in building are Y per cent higher” cannot be supported from these figures.

Summarising statement on this topic (not in this form on the source page), with rating: Wages drive costs everywhere.

Evidence. WKO, collective agreement construction 2022; WKO, collective agreement construction 2025; WKO, wage order construction 2025; HDB, wages and pay in the construction trade; IZ, development of the minimum wage; Slov-Lex, minimum wage 2027 (notice 232/2026); Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 March 2026; Destatis, hourly labour costs in the EU; Eurostat, news of 31 March 2026; WIFO, table 1.4 consumer prices; CBS, HICP euro area and EU. The full references are in the sources block below.

What WIFO shows. In September 2022 WIFO compiled, in a study for the City of Vienna (table 1), the prices of important material components of the construction cost index for housing: the change from December 2020 to December 2021 and from December 2021 to May 2022. Chained (own calculation) this gives for the 17 months from December 2020 to May 2022: iron and steel +144.6%, bitumen +88.5%, fuels +83.6%, non-ferrous metals +64.5%, raw wood and semi-finished wood products +43.5%; material overall became 43.3% dearer. Only iron and steel more than doubled (factor 2.45); bitumen and fuels reached 1.89 times and 1.84 times the level of December 2020, non-ferrous metals 1.65 times.

WIFO, table 1 “Selected material components of the construction cost indices” (housing and settlement construction); two independent readings agree on all figures. Monthly values of the construction cost index (costs to the contractor, excluding VAT), not annual averages. Chain: (1 + rate 1) times (1 + rate 2) minus 1. Weight in the basket according to WIFO; the text we read does not state the base. The eight rows add up to 65.2, material overall has, according to WIFO, a weight of 50.9%, wages of 49.1% in the construction cost index. The row “Wood, wood and cork products” is not on the source page.

How much does each material count? A high percentage on a small weight moves the index little. Iron and steel has, among the rows listed, after other building materials (20.4), the largest weight (18.2); bitumen (2.7) and fuels (1.6) weigh little. Multiplying weight and chained change (own calculation, an approximation because the weights need not refer to December 2020), about 66.6% of the sum of the eight rows falls on iron and steel, 10.3% on other building materials, 8.8% on non-ferrous metals and 6.0% on bitumen. That is no statement about causes but the arithmetic of an index with fixed weights.

What happened after May 2022. The WIFO table ends in May 2022; we read no series of individual materials for the time after that for Austria. The sub-index “other costs” of the construction cost index (material, energy, transport, equipment) stood at 118.6 in the annual average 2021, 137.5 in 2022 (the highest of the annual values read), 133.0 in 2023, 132.9 in 2024 and 133.6 in 2025 (2020 = 100): from 2022 to 2023 a fall of 4.5 points (−3.3%), that is 12% of the rise on 2020, afterwards no further fall, but no further rise either. The overall index rose by 10.4% in 2021 and 10.1% in 2022 (annual averages), then by 1.1% (2023), 3.6% (2024) and 2.3% (2025). The source page writes that the peaks had “largely come back” but left “a higher base level”. The second can be documented: “other costs” stand +33.6% above 2020 in 2025. The first cannot be documented for Austria from the figures read here: in the annual average only about an eighth of the rise in “other costs” went back, and we read no series of individual materials after May 2022. Rating: Peaks came back down.

How to read this. Three things. First: the construction cost index measures what the contractor has to spend (excluding VAT); the WIFO values are monthly values (December 2020, December 2021, May 2022) and not comparable with the annual averages of the other countries. Second: of the two wood rows of WIFO the source page shows only “raw wood and semi-finished wood products” (+43.5%, weight 0.7); the second wood row (“Wood, wood and cork products”, weight 3.7) rose by only 15.1% chained. The row “Other building materials” is called “Other building materials incl. bricks” on the source page; the addition is not in the WIFO text we read. Third: the chain multiplies two rates of change between reference months; how prices ran in between is not included.

Evidence. WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: Steel +145%; Doubled in 17 months; Steel, bitumen, diesel in the shell.

What Destatis reports. In February 2022 and February 2023 the Federal Statistical Office published, in two press releases, the producer prices of selected building materials as an annual average on the previous year. Producer prices are the prices at which manufacturers sell; whether they include VAT and whether they are domestic sales, the texts we read do not state. For 2021 Destatis writes that the rise in wood and steel was as strong as never before since the survey began in 1949. Structural timber became 77.3% dearer in 2021, roof battens 65.1%, construction timber 61.4%, reinforcing steel in bars 53.2% and reinforcing mesh 52.8%; in 2022 came bar steel with 40.4%, bright steel with 39.1%, flat glass with 49.3% and diesel with 41.6%, while structural timber fell by 11.9% and construction timber rose by only 1.3%.

Producer prices of industrial products, annual average on the previous year (Destatis, press releases of 10 February 2022 and 1 February 2023). · = not named in the respective press release; no chain if a value is missing. Reinforcing steel in bars (2021 only) and bar steel (2022 only) are different products and are not chained. Bitumen is called “petroleum-based bitumen” in 2021 and “bitumen” in 2022; we assume it is the same product.

Materials against construction work. The producer price index of industrial products overall rose by 10.5% in 2021 and 32.9% in 2022 (excluding energy in 2022: +14.0%); the construction price index for residential buildings, which measures the prices of the finished construction work including VAT, by 9.1% in 2021 and 16.4% in 2022 (first publications, base 2015; in the current series, base 2021, the value for 2022 is +16.3%). Chained over both years reinforcing mesh rose by 111.0%, bitumen by 88.5%, structural timber by 56.2% and the construction price index by 27.0% (own calculation). These are different things: the construction price index also contains wages, profit and tax, material prices are only a part of it; their weight in the German index we have not read.

How to read this. Four limitations. First: these are annual averages; monthly peaks (such as May 2022 against December 2020, as at WIFO) are not in the press releases. Second: for ready-mixed concrete, cement, heating oil, gravel, sand and bricks we found no value in the two press releases, that is for exactly the materials a shell needs in large quantities. Third: for the time after 2022 we read no material prices; whether the peaks came back, they do not show (only structural timber had already fallen in 2022). Fourth: chaining annual averages is a calculation, not a measurement of a price path.

Evidence. Destatis, building materials 2021; Destatis, building materials 2022; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022. The full references are in the sources block below.

A shock within the year. According to press reports on data of the Slovak Statistical Office, building materials became 11.6% dearer in 2021 as an annual average, but 22.7% in December 2021 on December 2020; in 2022 they rose by 22.9% as an annual average and by 13.3% in December 2022 on the same month of the previous year. Chained, this gives for the two years a rise of the annual averages of +37.2% (construction works: +22.8%) and, December on December, of +39.0% (own calculation). Afterwards the rise flattened: +3.4% (2023), −0.6% (2024), +2.7% (2025); in December 2023 material prices were 0.7% below the same month of the previous year. A secondary source (CEIC) gives as the peak of the material index 130.1 in March 2023 (2021 = 100), that is 30.1% above the average of 2021.

Individual materials in 2021. A report by ASB.sk (November 2022) gives approximate values for 2021: reinforcing bars about +42%, chipboard about +41%, plywood about +20% and roof tiles about +15%; the values have not been cross-checked. We read no official series of individual materials.

How to read this. The figures come from press reports on the office’s data, not from the office’s own pages. The annual values for 2022 and 2023 are called “cumulative” in the report, not expressly “annual average”. Whether the prices include VAT is not stated anywhere. The December value 2021 (+22.7%) lies far above the annual average (+11.6%): that says only that prices rose in the course of 2021, not in which months.

Evidence. ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; ASB.sk, building materials 2021; CEIC, Slovak construction price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

The four areas have no common yardstick for the material shock; the table puts side by side what was measured. One figure they share can be counted: in all four areas the price of construction work rose more in 2022 than in 2021 (Austria 15.0% after 8.0%, Germany 16.4% after 9.1%, Slovakia 18.3% after 3.8%, EU-27 12.2% after 5.8%). Slovakia had the smallest rise in 2021 and the largest in 2022. Chained over both years Germany leads (+27.0%), ahead of Austria (+24.2%), Slovakia (+22.8%) and the EU-27 (+18.7%); but the prices are not measured in the same way (VAT, base, survey), so the order is only an indication.

Price of construction work: Austria construction price index for housing and settlement construction excluding VAT; Germany construction price index for new residential buildings including VAT (first publication, base 2015); Slovakia prices of construction works (VAT not stated); EU-27 construction prices of new residential buildings (Eurostat, VAT not stated). Annual rates in per cent, chain own calculation. Austria 2021: according to the press release of 10 February 2022 the comparison of the construction price indices of 2020 and 2021 is possible only to a limited extent because of different baskets and weights.

The same materials in 2021, measured differently

Steel rose in 2021 by 42 to 66 per cent in all three areas where we read it, bitumen by 36 to 41 per cent in the two areas with a value: direction and order of magnitude agree, the figures themselves are not measured in the same way. Coincidence: for bitumen the chain gives +88.5% both in Austria (December 2020 to May 2022, WIFO) and in Germany (annual averages 2020 to 2022, Destatis). The periods and ways of measuring differ; we read nothing into the agreement.

How to read this. Comparable are the direction (a material shock in 2021 and 2022 in every area where materials were measured) and the price of construction work as a common figure; not comparable are the levels of the material prices, because points in time, measures and products differ. There is no material series for the EU-27, and for no area did we read material prices after 2022. Statements of the kind “the material shock was stronger in country X than in country Y” cannot be supported from these figures.

Evidence. WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022); Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2022; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2023; vol.at, construction prices 2021; vol.at, construction prices 2022; leadersnet.at, construction prices 2022; Destatis, building materials 2021; Destatis, building materials 2022; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022; ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; ASB.sk, building materials 2021; Eurostat, news of 25 June 2026; Brussels Times, construction costs in the EU; IndexBox, construction prices of new residential buildings. The full references are in the sources block below.

What Statistics Austria shows. The statistical report SB 2-10 (4th quarter 2025) gives the construction price index for residential building and housing estates in 29 trade groups: eight groups of master-builder work (no. 1 to 8) and 21 groups of other construction work (no. 9 to 29), each as an annual average for 2025 and as four quarterly values (2020 = 100, excluding VAT). Overall the index stands at 136.3, for master-builder work together at 128.0 and for the other construction work at 143.2: the prices of construction work were on average 36.3% above 2020 in 2025, for master-builder work 28.0%, for the other construction work 43.2%. The rise on 2020 ranges from 13.5% (passenger lift) to 53.0% (glass façades); 15 groups are above the overall index, 12 at 140 or above. All eight groups of master-builder work are below the overall index (index 126.4 to 135.3), and the five groups with the highest index all belong to the other construction work.

Statistics Austria, statistical report SB 2-10, residential building and housing estates, annual average 2025, base 2020 = 100, excluding VAT; names as in the report, abbreviations (“u.”, “inkl.”, “Mwk”, “Leichtbaupl.”) written out. The rows were read in several retrievals and checked against the quarterly means, the total rows and the twelve values of the source page. The change is index minus 100. Rank: 1 = highest index; with equal index the order of the number. The column “Q1 to Q4” is the change from the quarterly value I to the quarterly value IV of 2025.

Twelve of 29. The source page shows twelve of the 29 groups (excavation, site development, concrete, masonry, setting work, plastering, screed, floor/wall sealing, roof sealing, roofing, sheet-metal work and timber construction) and highlights five of them as “shell in the narrow sense” (excavation, site development, concrete, masonry and floor/wall sealing). Its two sentences agree with the table: “The classic shell trades (excavation, concrete, masonry) are 26 to 29% higher” (excavation +26.4%, concrete +27.0%, masonry +29.4%) and “roof, plumbing and timber construction” with “40 to 49%” (roof +40.2%, sheet-metal work +48.6%, timber construction +46.1%). Of the 17 groups not shown, five lie above every group shown (glass façades +53.0%, electrical work +52.4%, gas/water +52.3%, aluminium windows +51.3% and heating/ventilation +48.8%), one below (passenger lift +13.5%) and eleven in between. Excavation, which the source page uses as the indicator for earthworks, ranks 28 of the 29 groups (1 = highest index). The five groups highlighted as shell rose by 26.4 to 35.3%.

“Today” means 2025. The source page writes that the chart shows “what a client pays more today than in 2020”. What is meant is the annual average 2025. For 2026 we read nothing by trade group; the construction price index as a whole stood at 101.5 in the 1st quarter of 2026 (2025 = 100), +2.1% on a year earlier.

Two measures for master-builder work. For master-builder work two official series stand side by side: the construction price index by trade group (no. 1 to 8) at 128.0 (price of the work, +28.0% on 2020) and the construction cost index for master-builder work at 131.1 (costs to the contractor, +31.1%; labour 127.1, other costs 135.2). Costs rose by 3.1 pp more than prices. That is a difference between two indices with different weights and groups, not a measure of the profit margin. The same pattern in other building construction: the report gives the same groups for it as well (overall 139.8, master-builder work 127.8, other construction work 146.2); master-builder work rose by 27.8% there, other construction work by 46.2%.

Within the year 2025. The annual average hides the course of the year. From the 1st to the 4th quarter of 2025 the overall index rose from 135.5 to 136.8 (+1.0%), master-builder work from 127.3 to 128.2 (+0.7%) and the other construction work from 142.2 to 143.9 (+1.2%); the strongest rises were in aluminium windows (+3.5%), plastic windows (+3.5%) and timber construction (+3.3%), falls in drywall (−0.2%) and ETICS (−0.6%) (own calculation from the quarterly values).

How to read this. Four things. First: the construction price index states what the contractor charges the client (excluding VAT), not what it spends; the construction cost index is a different series. Second: the distance of 2025 from 2020 is a five-year value, not an annual rate, and does not say in which year prices rose (the year-by-year comparison is in the tab “Overall”). Third: we have not read the weights of the groups in the overall index; a group with a high rise can be small, and the figures do not show how much a group contributes to the rise of the whole. Fourth: trade groups are groups of construction services, not occupations; master-builder work (no. 1 to 8) also contains setting, plastering and screed work, which the source page does not highlight as shell in the narrow sense, and what counts as “classic shell” is decided by the source page, not by the statistics.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 8 May 2026; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; Eurostat, metadata Austria. The full references are in the sources block below.

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: Shell trades +26 to 29%; Roof, sheet-metal, timber +40 to 49%; Twelve of 29 groups.

What Destatis reports. In its press releases on construction prices the Federal Statistical Office names, besides the overall index for new residential buildings, individual construction services with their change on the same month of the previous year (prices including VAT). Which areas are named changes from release to release. The table shows five reporting months: November 2019, 2020 and 2021 from the releases of 10 January 2020, 8 January 2021 and 10 January 2022 (base 2015 = 100), May 2026 from the release of 10 July 2026 and August 2026 from a report by baulinks.de on the release of 9 October 2026 (base 2021 = 100; we did not read the release itself).

Price index for new residential buildings, conventional construction, including VAT; change on the same month of the previous year in per cent (Destatis). · = not named in the release. In November 2020 and November 2021 the cut in VAT from July to December 2020 has an effect; the heating row is called “heating systems and central water heating (including heat pumps)” in 2026, the roof row in the report on August 2026 “roofing work” (“Dachdeckungsarbeiten”; in the release of November 2019 “Dachdeckungs- und Dachabdichtungsarbeiten”, roof covering and roof waterproofing work); we treat them as the same series. “Low- and medium-voltage installations” (2019, 2020) and “electrical, security and IT installations” (2026) are shown separately because the name differs.

The spread between the trades. In November 2021 the areas named (including road building and other types of building) lay between 9.0% (road building) and 38.9% (carpentry and timber), a range of 29.9 pp; in August 2026 between 4.2% (masonry) and 7.6% (roofing), a range of 3.4 pp. The overall index for residential buildings rose by 14.4% in November 2021 (without the base effect of the VAT cut of 2020: 11.6%) and by 5.5% in August 2026; shell work overall and finishing work overall stood at +15.7% and +13.5% in November 2021, at +5.4% and +5.7% in August 2026. The outlier of 2021 is timber: carpentry and timber construction became 38.9% dearer in November 2021 and 29.7% in the annual average 2021 (overall index: +14.4% and +9.1%); in August 2026 they are at +7.2% in the upper part of the range, behind roofing (+7.6%).

Annual averages 2021 and 2022

Annual average on the previous year, Destatis (press releases of 10 February 2022 and 1 February 2023 on construction prices and building materials). · = not named in the release of that year. Whether VAT is included is not stated expressly in the texts we read; for the housing index it otherwise applies.

The annual averages of shell work and finishing work from 2021 to 2025 (base 2021 = 100: shell +27.4%, finishing +39.0%) are in the card “Germany: shell and finishing, building materials and wages” in the tab “Labour against materials”.

How to read this. Five limitations. First: every figure is a change on the same month of the previous year; rates of different reference dates cannot be chained, and no price level follows from the table. Second: the prices include VAT; in November 2020 the overall index stood at −0.1% instead of +2.5% without the cut, in November 2021 at +14.4% instead of +11.6% without the base effect. Third: the values for August 2026 come from a report on the release, not from the release. Fourth: how Destatis assigns the individual trades to “shell work” and “finishing work” and with what weight they enter the overall index (weighting scheme 2021) we have not read; the table makes no assignment. Fifth: the releases do not name the same areas every month; a gap (·) does not mean that the area was not measured.

Evidence. Destatis, press release of 10 January 2020; Destatis, press release of 8 January 2021; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022; Destatis, building materials 2021; Destatis, building materials 2022; Destatis, press release of 10 July 2026; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering. The full references are in the sources block below.

The source page says four things about earthworks: there is no index series of its own, the trade group “excavation and deep foundations” is the best approximation, the construction cost index for road building shows the dynamics more clearly, and earth moving depends strongly on diesel, bitumen, transport and landfill charges. The table checks the statements one by one.

Austria: road building and housing, both as construction costs

Statistics Austria, press releases of 15 January 2026 (annual average 2025) and 14 August 2026 (July 2026, provisional); costs to the contractor, excluding VAT. For housing the press release gave a provisional 105.5, the OeNB table (data as of 17 October 2026) shows 105.7; the chain uses the value of the press release.

Germany: earthworks and road building against the overall index

The German price index for road building rose more than the overall index for residential buildings in three of five reporting months (November 2019, May and August 2026), less in November 2020 and November 2021 (−1.2 and −5.4 percentage points). In the material price shock of 2021 the rise in road building, at +9.0%, was the smallest of all areas named, while bitumen became 36.1% dearer in the annual average 2021 and asphalt mix 25.8% in 2022 (producer prices). Why, the sources do not show: the price of road-building work also contains labour, equipment and profit, and the link between material price and the price of the work does not follow by itself.

Slovakia: A secondary source (CEIC, naming the Statistical Office of Slovakia) gives for the 1st quarter of 2025 (2021 = 100) 147.0 for building construction and 141.6 for civil engineering; civil engineering therefore rose by 5.4 points less than building construction since 2021. We found no series for earthworks. EU-27: no split read.

How to read this. The source page puts “excavation” (construction price index, price of the work, housing, one trade group) next to “road building” (construction cost index, costs to the contractor, civil engineering). These are two different indices, differing in kind, type of construction and composition; the sentence “road building shows the dynamics more clearly” in fact compares road-building costs with housing costs (table above). That road building rose more holds for Austria in the two periods measured and for Germany in three of five reporting months, not for Slovakia (secondary source) and not for Germany in the shock year 2021. We did not use the civil-engineering table of the construction price index in the Austrian report; see the card “Where figures contradict each other” in the tab “What holds up”.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2020; Destatis, press release of 8 January 2021; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022; Destatis, press release of 10 July 2026; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; Destatis, building materials 2021; Destatis, building materials 2022; CEIC, Slovak construction price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: No “earthworks” series; Excavation as approximation; Road building 135.8 and 147; Road building shows the dynamics.

The four areas have no common split by trades. Austria gives 29 trade groups (annual average against 2020), Germany names 13 to 16 areas per release with the rate on the same month of the previous year, for Slovakia we have only the split into building construction and civil engineering from a secondary source, for the EU-27 nothing. What can be compared is therefore not the level but the position of a trade relative to the overall index of its own country: above or below the average.

Position against the overall index. In five of eight trades Austria and Germany lie on the same side of their overall index: roofing, timber construction and electrical work above, concrete and masonry below. In the other three (metalwork, thermal insulation systems and heating) the German value is at most 0.5 pp away from the overall index, practically at the average, while the Austrian distance is 6.3 to 12.5 index points. Period and measure differ (Austria five years, Germany one year), the assignment of the trades is ours (own assignment, the names are not identical); only the side on which a trade lies is compared.

Shell against finishing. In Austria the other construction work rose by 43.2%, master-builder work by 28.0% (prices, 2025 against 2020); in Germany finishing work by 39.0%, shell work by 27.4% (prices including VAT, 2025 against 2021). Both countries show that finishing rose more than the shell; the delimitations and periods differ, the levels are not comparable. Slovakia splits differently (building construction, civil engineering), for the EU-27 there is nothing.

How to read this. The direction is comparable: roofing, timber and electrical lie above the country’s own overall index in both, concrete and masonry below, and finishing rose more than the shell. The levels are not comparable, because periods, measures, VAT and groups differ. Statements of the kind “trade X rose more in Austria than in Germany” cannot be supported from these figures. For Slovakia and the EU-27 there are no values read for the trades.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Destatis, press release of 10 July 2026; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; CEIC, Slovak construction price index; Eurostat sts_copi_a (via DBnomics); Eurostat, metadata construction prices and costs. The full references are in the sources block below.

What the basket is. Statistics Austria has switched the construction cost index for residential building and housing estates to base 2025. The document “Construction cost index basket for residential building and housing estates, base year 2025” names a research report as its source (revision base 2025, created on 13 February 2026; research body Christian Schinko and Frank Lulei, Vienna 2025). The basket has two levels: A. labour at 50.23% and B. other costs at 49.77% of total costs. The material and other costs (B) split into the master-builders’ material costs (34 items, 22.25% of total costs) and the material costs of the Professionisten (specialist trades; 51 items, 27.52%); together that makes 85 items. Each item has an individual weight within its group and a share of total costs (“Anteil an Gesamt”); the individual weight times the weight of the group gives this share, which we recomputed for all 85 items. How the weights were determined is not stated in the table we read; we did not read the research report itself.

Statistics Austria, basket of the construction cost index for residential building and housing estates, base year 2025 (research report, created on 13 February 2026). The names of the labour rows are as in the document; what “mit BUAG” and “ohne BUAG” (with and without BUAG) means, the document does not explain (in construction BUAG usually abbreviates the Bauarbeiter-Urlaubs- und Abfertigungsgesetz, the act on holiday and severance pay of construction workers; this expansion is ours, not the document’s). The document also shows the intermediate rows “Baumeister 49.2534” and “Professionisten 50.7466” within labour (per cent of labour); the three Professionisten rows together make up 25.49% of total costs. The material costs of master builders and Professionisten are the sums of the 34 and 51 items respectively (own calculation); the weights of the two groups within the material costs (44.7054% and 55.2946%) are in the document. The right-hand column is own calculation: share divided by group times 100.

From base 2020 to base 2025. In the basket of base 2020 labour had a weight of 49.13% (standard documentation of Statistics Austria; WIFO gave labour 49.1 and materials 50.9 per cent in 2022), now it is 50.23%: a rise of 1.10 percentage points. That is a change of the weights at the revision, not a rise in wages: the weights describe the composition of the costs in the base year. Why labour weighs more in 2025 than in 2020, the texts we read do not say.

What the source page shows of it. The page gives “Lohn, gesamt (alle Gewerke) 50.2%”, “Sachkosten Baumeister 22.2%” and “Sachkosten Professionisten 27.5%” as well as eleven items and a chart; all these figures agree with the basket (card “The source page against the basket”). Not on the page are the split of labour into four rows and 74 of the 85 items.

How to read this. Three things. First: the weights are shares of the costs of the building firm in the base year, not prices and not construction volume; they say what the index is made of, not what a house costs. Second: the “labour” of the basket is the labour of all trades of a house together (master builders, auxiliary and secondary construction trades, metal and electrical); the card “Labour in the index, personnel costs in the firms” below shows why this figure must not be confused with the personnel costs of a construction firm. Third: since the base year prices have changed at different speeds; how far today’s shares differ from the weights, the basket does not show.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report). The full references are in the sources block below.

The largest items. If items of the same name in the two groups of material costs are added together (own calculation; 57 different names), the five largest are: Ready-mixed concrete, ready-mixed mortar (3.82%); Reinforcing steel, steel mesh (3.31%); Timber (2.50%); Steel, galvanised thin sheet (2.38%); Windows (2.10%). The ten largest items together make up 23.6% of total costs, the 20 largest 34.6%; labour (50.2%) remains by far the largest block. Concrete and steel come first, but timber (in both groups), galvanised thin sheet and windows also each carry more than 2 per cent of total costs.

Share of total costs in per cent, basket base 2025, the 15 largest items; dark: material costs of master builders, light: material costs of Professionisten. Items of the same name in both groups are added (own calculation). The values are in the tables below.

Concrete and steel. Ready-mixed concrete and mortar have an individual weight of 17.17% in the master builders’ material costs, reinforcing steel and mesh 14.88%; together that is 32.0% of the master builders’ material costs, 7.13% of total costs and 14.3% of all material costs (both groups). Depending on the reference it is therefore 32.0%, 14.3% or 7.13%; the source page names the reference (“in the material costs of the master-builder work”), the card “The source page against the basket” checks the sentence.

Timber appears in both groups. For the master builders timber has a share of 0.80% of total costs (individual weight 3.61%), for the Professionisten 1.70% (individual weight 6.18%), together 2.50%. In the group of the Professionisten windows (2.06%), galvanised thin sheet (1.99%) and timber (1.70%) are the largest items, followed by HVAC and sanitary systems and appliances (1.66%) and aluminium goods (1.63%). Two items appear with weight 0 in the document: concrete roof tiles (master builders) and reinforcing steel, steel mesh (Professionisten).

How to read this. Two things. First: “individual weight” and “share of total costs” belong to the same item but to different references; anyone who compares or adds them must keep the groups apart (master builders’ material costs 22.25%, Professionisten 27.52% of total costs). Second: items of the same name in both groups are different rows of the basket (for example timber for the master builders and timber for the Professionisten); our combination in the chart is own calculation and not a value of the document.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

All figures agree. The three headline rows, the eleven items of the table and the twelve bars of the chart on the source page agree with the basket, as far as the page rounds. The only deviation is the bar “Übrige Positionen” with 17.3% instead of 17.4%: the page computed it as 100 minus the rounded bars, not from the exact values. That is rounding, not an error in the data. The card also checks whether the sentences of the page fit the figures.

The table of the page (“Davon Rohbau-relevant, Anteil an den Gesamtbaukosten”)

The chart of the page (“Warenkorb Baumeisterarbeiten”, per cent of the master builders’ material costs)

Page: section 06 “Woraus der Rohbau heute besteht”. The values of the page are in per cent with two decimals (table) and one decimal (chart). Column “Value in the basket”: official values, four decimals, Statistics Austria, basket base 2025. The labels of the chart are shortened on the page.

Two references on one page. The chart shows the individual weight in the master builders’ material costs (ready-mixed concrete 17.2%), the table beside it the share of total costs (ready-mixed concrete 3.82%). Both are the same item (17.17% times 22.25% gives 3.82%). The chart has no axis title; the reference is in the sentence before it and in the tooltip of the chart, that of the table in the intermediate row. Anyone who reads only the number can easily relate it to the wrong quantity.

“Concrete and steel alone make up almost a third.” That is correct for the material costs of the master-builder work, which the sentence names: the individual weights of ready-mixed concrete and reinforcing steel add up to 32.0%. Of total costs it is 7.13%, of all material costs (both groups) 14.3%. The table beside the sentence shows shares of total costs (3.82% and 3.31%); anyone who adds them does not arrive at a third but at 7.13%. The sentence is therefore correct and the reference is in the sentence; a risk remains that it is read as “a third of the construction costs”.

“Davon Rohbau-relevant” (of which relevant to the shell) is an assignment by the page. The basket divides the material costs into master builders and Professionisten, not into shell and finishing. The table of the page shows eleven items of the master builders’ material costs (together 17.03% of total costs, that is 76.5% of the master builders’ material costs) and calls them “relevant to the shell”. Among them are ready-mixed plaster, screed and tile adhesive (1.43%) and polystyrene foam boards (1.31%); whether they count as shell is a matter of definition. In the section on the trades, by contrast, the page highlights only five trade groups as “shell in the narrow sense” and does not count plastering and screed work. The page thus uses “shell” in two delimitations. Conversely the table lacks items of the Professionisten that can play a part in a shell, for example timber among the Professionisten (1.70%) and steel in thin sheet and flat steel (together 2.91%).

Table and chart do not name the same items. The chart includes timber (individual weight 3.6%, share 0.80%) and combines the two equipment items into “Geräte inkl. Reparatur” (equipment incl. repair; 7.5%). The table leaves timber out although it is larger than the last three rows (diesel 0.70%, landfill 0.62%, gravel 0.61%) and shows only “Geräte (Abschreibung, Zinsen)” (equipment: depreciation, interest) at 1.12%; the repair (0.54%) is missing there. Eleven rows in the table, twelve bars in the chart: both displays are correct in themselves, but they do not show the same selection.

What the weights do not say. The sentence “Anyone who wants to hedge material risks looks first at these two” is advice, not a measurement. The weight says how large an item is in the basket, not how strongly its price fluctuates or whether a risk can be hedged. For “iron and steel” WIFO gives +144.6% in the price shock (December 2020 to May 2022, two partial rates chained; tab “Price shock”); for ready-mixed concrete we read no price series. Advice based on the weight alone therefore tells only half the story.

How to read this. Three things. First: “agrees” means the figure of the page corresponds to the basket; it does not mean that the basket reflects the reality of a particular building project. Second: we read the basket only as a table; the research report that justifies the weights is not available to us. Third: the ratings of the sentences are in the tab “What holds up”; here are the figures on which they rest.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022). The full references are in the sources block below.

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: Concrete and steel almost a third; Relevant to the shell; Table and chart; Hedging material risks.

What the source page says. For the marketing costs of real estate Statistics Austria keeps no index. In developers’ calculations marketing and sales are “usually” entered “as a percentage of the total investment”. The page gives two rules of thumb, related to the total investment costs of a developer project: marketing (website, visualisation, brochure, advertising) 0.5 to 1.5% and sales including estate agent 2 to 4%. It says itself that these are “rules of thumb from practice, not official statistics”.

What we found. A measurement, study or survey that checks these percentages (marketing and sales costs of developer projects as a percentage of the total investment) we found for neither Austria nor Germany, Slovakia or the EU-27 (web search, no specialist database). An index of Statistics Austria for marketing costs we did not find either; a web search cannot prove that none exists. The rules of thumb thus remain what the page itself says: figures from experience without a source. Only a part of the framework can be documented, the rules on the estate agent’s commission.

How the rules of thumb relate to it. The ceiling for the commission of one contracting party (3.0% net, 3.6% including VAT) lies within the range of 2 to 4% that the page gives for “sales including estate agent”. That makes the range not implausible but does not document it: the commission is calculated on the value of the transaction, that is the purchase price (so the Austrian extract: “des Wertes”), whereas the rules of thumb of the page relate to the total investment costs of the developer; the two are not the same. According to the page the sales of a developer project contain more than the agent, and whether and how far a developer bears the commission is not covered by the texts we read. For “marketing 0.5 to 1.5%” we have no cross-check at all.

How to read this. Three things. First: the reference “total investment” is wider than the construction costs (it also contains land, planning, financing and other costs of the developer); the percentages therefore cannot be applied to the construction costs of this chapter. Second: a range such as “2 to 4%” says nothing about the individual case; location, market conditions, number of units and sales channel shift it, without our having read figures on this. Third: the legal rules concern the maximum commission of the agent, not the amount of the sales costs of a developer.

Evidence. Rules of professional conduct for estate agents, section 15; Infina, brokerage fees on purchase; German Civil Code section 656d, agreements on brokerage costs. The full references are in the sources block below.

Statements of the source page on this topic, with rating: No index for marketing costs; Percentage of total investment; Marketing 0.5 to 1.5%; Sales 2 to 4%.

Two figures that could both be called “labour share”. In the basket of the construction cost index labour is weighted at 50.2% of construction costs. In the accounts of construction firms personnel costs look different: in the section “Bau” (chamber classification) they were 30.2% of production value in 2024, in the construction industry 33.3% (Statistics Austria, special evaluation of the structural business statistics, published by the WKO). In Germany personnel costs in the main construction trade were 26.2% of gross production value in 2021 (enterprises with 20 or more employees; Federal Association of the German Construction Industry, after figures of the Federal Statistical Office). The firms’ figures lie between 26.2% and 33.3%, well below the 50.2% of the basket.

All values in per cent. Austria: Statistics Austria, special evaluation of the structural business statistics in the chamber classification (construction 1010 and construction industry 2090), economic indicators 2024; the percentages were recomputed from the printed euro values and agree with the printed whole percentages. Germany: 2021 Federal Association of the German Construction Industry, key construction data 2023; 2018 Bauprofessor after Destatis, series 4 row 5.3. Both German sources are secondary sources. Years, delimitations and references are not the same; the values are not a time series.

Why the figures do not run against each other. They measure different things. The basket weights the costs of building a house as a whole; the labour of the Professionisten (auxiliary and secondary construction trades, metal and electrical) is labour there and makes up 25.5% of total costs. In the firms’ statistics it is a firm’s own staff that counts; what it hands out to subcontractors is shown under purchased services. In Germany that was 32.5% of gross production value in the main construction trade in 2021 (“Nachunternehmerleistung”), more than personnel costs (26.2%). The Austrian table shows “purchases of goods and services” at 67.8% (construction 1010) and 66.8% (construction industry) of production value; how subcontractor services are booked there does not emerge from the table. In addition, according to the source gross production value also includes the services of subcontractors taken in, and the remainder up to 100 per cent is profit; the construction cost index, by contrast, measures the costs of the building firm (Statistics Austria). The two figures thus do not contradict each other, but they cannot be offset against each other either.

By size and by kind of firm. In Germany personnel costs fall with the size of the firm from 29.9% (20 to 49 employees) to 22.7% (500 and more), while subcontractor services rise from 22.7% to 42.5%: larger firms pass more work on, and their own personnel costs contribute less to production value. In Austria (construction 1010) personnel costs lie between 30.6% and 34.4% in the classes from 10 employees. By kind of firm the range in Germany in 2018 goes from 9.2% for developers via 20.6% in the construction of buildings and 25.1% in the main construction trade to 32.6% in the finishing trades. There is thus no single “labour share of construction”; it depends on who is calculating, what counts as output and how much the firm carries out itself.

What is missing. For Slovakia and the EU-27 we read neither the weights of a construction price or cost index nor the cost structure of construction firms; we did not read the weights of the German construction price index (weighting scheme) either. A comparison of the baskets of the four areas is therefore not possible; only Austria and Germany can be compared, and only the firms’ figures, with the limitations stated.

How to read this. Three things. First: firms’ figures describe firms, the basket a structure; “labour” means something different in each. Second: the years differ (2018, 2021, 2024) and so do the references (production value in Austria, gross production value in Germany; we did not check the definitions against each other). Third: the German values are secondary sources; a comparison with the publications of the Federal Statistical Office is still to be done.

Evidence. WKO, structural business statistics, construction (1010), 2024; WKO, structural business statistics, construction industry (2090), 2024; HDB, key construction data 2023, cost structure of the main construction trade 2021; Bauprofessor, cost structure of the construction industry 2018; Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

Statement of the source page on this topic, with rating: Labour 50.2% of construction costs.

How the calculation works. The calculator divides the index value of the target year by that of the starting year and multiplies the amount by this factor. The yearly values are annual averages; the latest value is, for the Austrian construction cost index, September 2026 (provisional), for the German construction price index August 2026. Results from €10,000 are rounded to €100, smaller ones to the whole euro. Example: €500,000 from the year 2010 corresponds, by the construction cost index, to about €824,700 in September 2026 (307.6 ÷ 186.5 = 1.6493, own calculation).

An example that can be read without script: €500,000 from the year 2021

Own calculation from the series of the card “The series behind the calculator”. The five series do not measure the same thing (card “What the indices measure” in the tab “Overall”): Austria cost index (costs without VAT), Austria price index (prices without VAT), Germany prices with VAT, Slovakia construction works as a whole, EU-27 new residential buildings. The results may be compared as to direction and approximate size, not to the decimal place, and not as an amount from one area into another.

Costs or prices. An offer is a price. The construction cost index measures what the building firm spends, the construction price index what it charges the client (tab “Overall”). From 2020 to 2025 the cost index rose by 30.2%, the price index by 36.3%: €500,000 of the year 2020 become €651,200 with the cost index and €681,500 with the price index (own calculation). The source page converts a shell-construction offer with the cost index. The calculator offers the price index only from 2020, because we have read no values for the earlier years on the same base.

Housing as a whole or only the shell. Both indices apply to residential building and housing estates as a whole. For master-builder work alone, which the source page takes to be the classic shell, Statistics Austria gives a cost index of 131.1 for 2025, for housing as a whole 130.2 (2020 = 100). The difference of 0.9 points corresponds, on €500,000 from the year 2020, to about €4,500 (own calculation). We have read no series of master-builder work with yearly values since 2010; the calculator therefore cannot show the difference for earlier years.

How to read this. Four things. First: the result is the change of a basket of construction works, not the price of a particular building project; an offer depends on region, the capacity utilisation of building firms, the type of contract (fixed or variable price) and the scope of work, as the source page also says. Second: for index clauses in contracts the index and month agreed there apply, not an annual average; we have read no standard on that. Third: the German index includes VAT; its cut from July to December 2020 is part of the annual value 2020 (card “Germany: construction prices and the VAT cut”). Fourth: Slovakia and the EU-27 exist in the chapter only as chained annual rates from 2021; the calculator does not go back further there.

Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2023; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2022; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; Eurostat sts_copi_a (via DBnomics); Eurostat, news of 25 June 2026; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

The table shows all values the calculator works with. It uses only these figures; anyone who wants to recompute them finds everything here. A dot (·) means: for this year the chapter has no value in this series.

Annual averages. * Own calculation: Austria cost index 2026 = 289.9 (annual average 2025) times 106.1 (September 2026, provisional, base 2025 = 100, OeNB table) divided by 100; Germany 2018 to 2020 converted from the earlier base 2015 = 100 to 2021 = 100; Slovakia and the EU-27 chained from the annual rates from 2021 (2021 = 100). Austria cost index 2010 to 2025: WKO yearbook (base 1990), as of January 2026; Austria price index: Statistics Austria (base 2020 = 100); Germany 2021 to 2025 and August 2026: Destatis. The latest month we have read is September 2026 (OeNB table, data as of 17 October 2026). For July 2026 the press release of Statistics Austria gave a provisional 105.5, the OeNB table now gives 105.7. The 2026 row of the Austrian cost index compares one month with the annual average of 2025 (+6.1%); against September 2025 the OeNB table reports +5.7%.

What the series contain. The Austrian cost index and the price index apply to residential building and housing estates and are without VAT; the German index applies to new residential buildings of conventional construction and includes VAT; the Slovak series concerns construction works as a whole, the EU series new residential buildings. Chained series (Slovakia, EU-27) carry the rounding errors of the annual rates with them; a deviation of a few tenths of an index point from the series of the statistical offices is possible.

Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2023; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2022; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; Destatis, topic page construction prices; ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; CEIC, Slovak construction price index; Eurostat sts_copi_a (via DBnomics); Eurostat, Statistics Explained, construction price and cost indices; Eurostat, metadata construction prices and costs. The full references are in the sources block below.

What the page calculates. The calculator in the section “Hochrechnung auf heute” of the source page takes the construction cost index of residential building and housing estates (base 1990 = 100) from 2010 to 2025 and the provisional value for July 2026, converts an amount from one chosen year to another and shows beside it a table of years with index, change, factor and amount. The preset is €500,000 from 2010 to today; the result is €819,800. The table highlights changes of 5 per cent or more.

What we checked. All 16 yearly values and the value for July 2026 in the calculator of the page agree with our series, and the preset result is the same (€819,800). The calculation of the page is therefore correct. With the latest month, September 2026 (106.1 on the base 2025 = 100, OeNB table), the same calculation gives €824,700. Three things remain to be clarified, none of which concerns the calculation: the choice of index (costs instead of prices, housing as a whole instead of the shell; see above), the table row for 2026 (it compares July 2026 with the annual average of 2025, +5.5%, while the official rate on July 2025 is +5.2%) and the word “today” (the page names July 2026, the OeNB table now has values up to September 2026). The table of the page highlights the rows 2021 (+10.4%), 2022 (+10.1%) and 2026 (+5.5%).

How to read this. The page itself says “indicative figure” and refers to region, capacity utilisation and type of contract. That sentence is right and is not qualified here. The rating of the statement that a shell-construction offer can be converted with the construction cost index for housing is in the tab “What holds up”.

Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report). The full references are in the sources block below.

Statement of the source page on this topic, with rating: Updating to today.

Two statements come up in almost every conversation about construction costs. Here is the short version; the rows of the ladder below contain the sources and what the figures do not show.

“Building has become about a third dearer since 2020 or 2021”

Annual averages, nominal. The series are brought to 2020 = 100 (Austria) and 2021 = 100 respectively and chained (own calculation). Consumer prices: Austria consumer price index, Germany consumer price index, EU-27 harmonised index. · = not found (web search, no specialist database); the consumer prices of Slovakia are available to us only up to 2023. * The year 2020 contains the cut in VAT from July to December 2020 and is of limited use as a base.

Depending on the series, the rise from 2021 to 2025 lies between 17.9% (Austrian construction costs) and 46.4% (Slovakia). A third fits only Germany (33.9%); the Austrian construction prices (26.2%) and the EU-27 (24.3%) lie below. With the base year 2020 the Austrian values come out higher (36.3% and 30.2%), because the rise of 2021 is then counted. Against consumer prices, construction prices rose faster from 2021 to 2025, in Austria (1.4 pp) and in the EU-27 (2.1 pp) only narrowly, in Germany markedly (15.7 pp); Austrian construction costs rose less than consumer prices. Rating: Partly documented (row “A third dearer”). That building became markedly dearer in all four areas is documented; “a third” fits individual series and depends on the base year.

“Materials rose first, then wages”

For Austria the sequence is visible in the sub-indices; the labour component caught up only from 2023. For Germany and Slovakia only approximations stand side by side: producer prices of individual materials against the agreed wage, building materials against the prices of construction works as a whole. The sequence is a pattern in time in the figures and not an explanation. Rating: for Austria Partly documented (row “Two waves”), for “everywhere wages drive construction costs” Simplifying (row “Wages drive costs everywhere”).

How to read this. The ratings are the judgement of this chapter. They say how well the statement is covered by figures we read, not whether building, buying or selling would make sense now.

Evidence. Sources and calculations are in the rows: “A third dearer”, “Dearer than consumer prices”, “Two waves”, “Labour is the real driver”, “Wages drive costs everywhere”.

Each row contains a statement as it appears on the source page “What the shell costs today” (40 rows) or as a summary claim about the four areas (3 rows in the area “Comparison of the areas”), the key figures for it and the rating. A click opens the row: what there is, what the figures do not show, how we rate it, and the sources. The level applies to the statement as it is worded in the row and to the period named. It is the judgement of this chapter and not the truth. The buttons filter the rows by area and by level.

No statement in this chapter receives the level “Refuted”: where figures speak against the wording, the rating is “Partly documented” or “Simplifying”, and the row says what is not right.

• Overall“The construction cost index measures what a building firm has to spend on labour, materials, energy and equipment. The construction price index measures what it charges the client.”2020 to 2025: construction cost index +30.2%, construction price index +36.3%, both excluding VATWell documented

  What there is. In its standard documentation Statistics Austria describes the construction cost index as an index of the costs a building firm incurs when building (labour and other costs) and the construction price index as an index of the prices for the building work. Both apply to residential building and housing estates, both exclude VAT. From 2020 to 2025 costs rose by 30.2%, prices by 36.3% (annual averages). The sentence on the page states the definition correctly.

  What the figures do not show. The margin of the building firm is measured by neither index; that prices rose more than costs does not mean that profit rose. Both indices apply to residential building as a whole, not to the shell alone (row “Shell or residential building”). The indices value an unchanged basket; what a particular house costs, they do not say.

  Rating. Well documented: the definition is in the official documentation, and both series are available with values from several publications.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, topic page construction price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Overall“Construction costs since 2018: +40%. Construction cost index, residential building, annual average 2018 to July 2026.”Construction cost index: 2018 98.1 (annual average), July 2026 137.4 (chained), that is +40.1%; 2018 to 2025: +32.7%Well documented

  What there is. Statistics Austria publishes the construction cost index for residential building and housing estates as an annual average. On the base 2020 = 100 the value for 2018 is 98.1 (converted from the series with base 1990), the value for 2025 is 130.2: +32.7%. For July 2026 the press release of 14 August 2026 gives a provisional 105.5 on the new base 2025 = 100; chained to the old base that is 137.4, and thus +40.1% on 2018 (own calculation). The figure on the page is correct. It can be traced with two sources: the statistical yearbook of the Austrian Economic Chamber (base 1990) and the table of the OeNB, which reproduces the values of Statistics Austria.

  What the figures do not show. The starting value is an annual average, the end value a single, provisional month of the current year; July 2026 is 5.5% above the annual average for 2025. Comparing annual average with annual average (2018 to 2025) gives 32.7%. The figure applies to the costs of the building firm in residential building as a whole, not to the shell and not to the prices the client pays (row “Shell or residential building”), and it is nominal: consumer prices rose by 34.7% from 2018 to 2025 (own calculation).

  Rating. Well documented: the figure is correct and can be traced with two sources, and the page itself names the start and the end point. Anyone who passes on “40 per cent since 2018” without that information mixes an annual average and a monthly value.

  Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• OverallTitle of the page: “What the shell costs today”. The key figures of the page (construction cost index and construction price index for residential building and housing estates) apply to residential building as a whole.2020 to 2025: prices, residential building as a whole +36.3%, master-builder work +28.0%; costs, residential building as a whole +30.2%, master-builder work +31.1%Simplifying

  What there is. The indices on which the key figures of the page are based apply to residential building and housing estates as a whole; the page says so in the label (“construction cost index, residential building”). For the shell in the sense of the page there are two narrower series. The construction price index for the eight groups of master-builder work stands at 128.0 in 2025, the overall index at 136.3: prices rose by 28.0% for master-builder work and by 36.3% overall (other construction work: 43.2%). The construction cost index for master-builder work stands at 131.1, that for residential building as a whole at 130.2: costs rose by 31.1% and 30.2%.

  What the figures do not show. For costs the difference is small (0.9 index points), for prices it is large (8.3 index points): anyone who reads the price figure of 36.3% as the rise “of the shell” overstates it by 8.3 pp according to the construction price index. What counts as the shell is defined by the page (“master-builder work” in section 02, five groups “in the narrow sense” in section 05); the statistics know only the groups.

  Rating. Simplifying: the title speaks of the shell, the key figures concern residential building as a whole. For costs that makes hardly any difference, for prices a large one.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Overall“Until 2020 all was calm, then two waves came: first the materials shock of 2021 and 2022, then the wage wave from 2023.”Costs: 2018 to 2020 +2.9%, +1.1%, +0.9%; 2021 +10.4%, 2022 +10.1%; 2023 to 2025 +1.1%, +3.6%, +2.3%. Sub-index other costs: 2021 +18.6%, 2022 +15.9%, 2023 −3.3%; sub-index labour: 2021 +2.1%, 2022 +2.9%, 2023 +7.0%, 2024 +8.1%, 2025 +4.2%Well documented

  What there is. The construction cost index rose by 2.9%, 1.1% and 0.9% a year from 2018 to 2020, by 10.4% and 10.1% in 2021 and 2022, then by 1.1%, 3.6% and 2.3%. In the breakdown of the index (tab “Labour against materials”) the rise in 2021 and 2022 came mainly from “other costs” (18.6% and 15.9% on the previous year, labour 2.1% and 2.9%): from 2020 to 2022, 19.1 of 21.6 index points fell on other costs (88%, own calculation). In 2023 other costs fell (−3.3%), the sub-index labour rose by 7.0%, in 2024 by 8.1% and in 2025 by 4.2%; from 2023 to 2025, 7.0 of 7.3 points fell on labour (96%). The construction price index rose by 8.0% in 2021, 15.0% in 2022 and 7.5% in 2023. The sequence “other costs first, then labour” is visible for Austria in the official index. Germany (building material prices strong in 2021 and 2022, collectively agreed wage on 1 January 2025 up by 7.5%) and Slovakia (in 2021 and 2022 building materials rose faster than construction works, in 2023 to 2025 construction works faster) show a similar direction.

  What the figures do not show. The sub-index “other costs” contains energy, transport and equipment as well as materials; the materials shock in the narrow sense shows in the material prices of WIFO (December 2020 to May 2022, tab “Price shock”). In 2023 the overall index rose by only 1.1% although the collective agreement raised wages by 9.5% in May and the sub-index labour rose by 7.0%: other costs fell in the same year. The value for 2022 was marked provisional in the report. The price index rose more in 2023 (7.5%) than the cost index. “Shock” and “wave” are descriptions, not measures; the figures do not show causes.

  Rating. Well documented: the sequence in time (in 2021 and 2022 mainly “other costs” rise, from 2023 labour) is in the official sub-indices of Austria; Germany and Slovakia show the same direction. “Shock” and “wave” describe without measuring, and “other costs” covers more than materials.

  Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2023; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2022; WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022); WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; WKO, collective agreement construction new agreement 2024; Destatis, building materials 2021; Destatis, building materials 2022; HDB, wages and pay in the construction trade; ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Overall“In 2026 costs are rising markedly again.”Construction cost index, Austria, change on the same month of the previous year: January +1.8%, May +5.9%, September +5.7% (2025 as a whole +2.3%); Germany August +5.5%; Slovakia June +6.1%Well documented

  What there is. In Austria the annual rate of the construction cost index rose from 1.8% in January to 5.9% in May and stood at 5.7% in September (OeNB table, data as of 17 October 2026, provisional); from April on every month lies above every annual value from 2023 to 2025 (the highest was 3.6% in 2024). In Germany the construction price index for residential buildings was 5.5% above the previous year in August 2026 (February 3.3%, May 5.0%), in Slovakia the prices of construction works were 5.1% above the previous year in April and 6.1% in June (press reports). For the EU-27 we found no value for 2026.

  What the figures do not show. The rates are changes on the same month of the previous year and contain base effects; the Austrian values are provisional. “Markedly” is relative: the rates of 2026 are below the annual rates of 2021 and 2022 (10.4% and 10.1%) and above those of 2023 to 2025. What triggered the rise in March and April (1.5% on the previous month in each case, before the wage increase of 1 May) the figures do not show; nor do they show whether a new surge begins or whether this stays a blip. The chapter gives no forecast.

  Rating. Well documented: three areas, the same direction, and for Austria an official table and a press release with the same value. The values for 2026 are provisional.

  Evidence. OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; TASR, construction work April 2026; teraz.sk, construction work June 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Overall“Currently, July 2026: +5.2%. Construction costs compared with July 2025, highest rise since 2022.”July 2026 +5.2% (press release and OeNB table); May +5.9%, September +5.7%; December 2022 +5.8%; annual values 2023 to 2025: +1.1%, +3.6%, +2.3%Partly documented

  What there is. The figure is correct: Statistics Austria reports a provisional +5.2% for July 2026 compared with July 2025 (105.5 on the base 2025 = 100), and the OeNB table shows the same value. For comparison with “since 2022”: in December 2022 the rate was 5.8%, the annual values for 2023, 2024 and 2025 were 1.1%, 3.6% and 2.3%, and from September to December 2025 2.0% to 2.6%. In the annual average for 2022 the rise was 10.1%.

  What the figures do not show. July was not the highest month of 2026: May (5.9%), June (5.5%), August (5.3%) and September (5.7%) are higher. “Currently” July was the latest value when the page was written; August and September are now available. For the months from January 2023 to August 2025 we have read no monthly rates; the annual values smooth and do not show whether one of those months was above 5.2%. It is documented that 2022 brought higher rates.

  Rating. Partly documented: the figure is correct and documented twice. Whether it is the highest rise “since 2022” cannot be checked for January 2023 to August 2025.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; Statistics Austria, press release construction cost index December 2022; WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Labour against materials“By 2023 the component ‘other’ (materials, energy, transport, equipment) was already a third above 2020 and has been practically frozen since.”Other costs (2020 = 100): 2021 118.6, 2022 137.5, 2023 133.0, 2024 132.9, 2025 133.6; labour: 102.1, 105.1, 112.5, 121.6, 126.7Well documented

  What there is. Statistics Austria reports the sub-indices labour and other costs (all costs except labour) for residential building and housing estates. Other costs stood at 133.0 in 2023, 132.9 in 2024 and 133.6 in 2025. That is +33.0% on 2020 and only +0.5% from 2023 to 2025. Other costs had their highest value in 2022 at 137.5; in 2023 they were 3.3% lower. The figures on the page are correct.

  What the figures do not show. “Other costs” is a collective term, not the price of a material. For 2026 there is no breakdown: the overall index rose by 1.5% on the previous month in both March and April 2026, before the wage increase of 1 May. Whether “other costs” stay flat in 2026 the figures do not show. The values for 2022 and 2025 are marked provisional in the reports.

  Rating. Well documented for 2021 to 2025, the period for which we read the sub-indices (2022 and 2025 provisional): official values, and the figures on the page are correct.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Labour against materials“Wages, by contrast, follow the collective agreements every year and catch up.”Labour (2020 = 100): 2023 112.5, 2024 121.6, 2025 126.7; gap to other costs from 20.5 to 6.9 points; collective agreement, 1 May: 2023 +9.50%, 2024 +7.15%, 2025 +2.70%, 2026 +3.60%Well documented

  What there is. The sub-index labour rose from 112.5 (2023) to 121.6 (2024, +8.1%) and 126.7 (2025, +4.2%), the sub-index other costs stayed at 133 to 134; the gap fell from 20.5 to 6.9 points. The collective agreements raised minimum wages in every year from 2019 to 2026. A plausibility check (own calculation): the increases of 1 May of +7.15% (2024) and +2.70% (2025) give, if one assumes they apply from 1 May, annual averages of +7.9% and +4.1% on the previous year, close to the rates of the index.

  What the figures do not show. The collective agreement sets minimum wages; the sub-index labour measures the wage costs of the building firm. How actual wages, ancillary costs and salaried staff enter we have not read. The plausibility check shows agreement in order of magnitude, not proof. “Catch up” describes the gap between the two sub-indices; whether wages also catch up in real terms is shown by the tab “Wages” (rows below).

  Rating. Well documented: both sub-indices are official, the collective agreements are documented in the texts of the Economic Chamber, and the plausibility check fits.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; WKO, collective agreement construction new agreement 2024; WKO, collective agreement construction 2025; WKO, collective agreement construction 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Labour against materials“Labour accounts for 50.2% of construction costs in the current basket …”Basket base 2025: labour 50.23%, other costs 49.77% (base 2020: 49.13%); personnel expenses of firms 2024: 30.2% and 33.3% of production valueWell documented

  What there is. The basket of Statistics Austria (base 2025) weights labour at 50.23% and other costs at 49.77% of total costs (base 2020: 49.13%). The figure on the page is correct. In the accounts of building firms personnel expenses look different: in 2024 they were 30.2% of production value in the trade section construction and 33.3% in the construction industry (Austria), and in 2021 26.2% of gross production value in the German main construction trades.

  What the figures do not show. The weight describes the composition of the costs of a house in the base year, not the costs of a shell-construction firm: the “labour” of the basket is the labour of all trades, including the specialist trades, and firms pass work to subcontractors, which appears in their statistics under purchased services. The figures do not contradict each other, but they cannot be offset against one another. That the 50.2% describes the shell, the page does not say.

  Rating. Well documented for the statement about the basket of the construction cost index (base 2025); the figure is not to be read as a wage share “of construction”.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; WKO, structural business statistics, construction (1010), 2024; WKO, structural business statistics, construction industry (2090), 2024; HDB, key construction data 2023, cost structure of the main construction trade 2021. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Labour against materials“… and is today the real driver.”Share of labour in the rise of the index: 2020 to 2022 12%, 2023 to 2025 96%, 2020 to 2025 43%Partly documented

  What there is. Own calculation from the sub-indices and the base weight of labour (49.13%): from 2020 to 2025 the overall index rose by 30.2 points, of which 13.1 were due to labour (43%) and 17.1 to other costs. From 2020 to 2022 it was 21.6 points, of which only 2.5 were due to labour (12%); in 2023 labour contributed 3.6 points, other costs −2.3. From 2023 to 2025 it was 7.3 points, of which 7.0 were due to labour (96%). In the last two years labour thus accounted for almost the whole rise, over the whole five years for less than half.

  What the figures do not show. “Driver” is a word for a cause; the index calculation shows which part of the index moved, not why. Over the whole five years labour accounts for less than half. For 2026 there is no breakdown, and the rise in March and April, before the wage increase of 1 May, cannot be attributed to labour. “Today” means 2023 to 2025 in these figures. That labour makes up 50.2% of the weights does not make it the driver: what matters is how its index moves.

  Rating. Partly documented: for 2023 to 2025 labour accounts for almost the whole rise, over 2020 to 2025 only 43% (2020 to 2022 only 12%), and for 2026 the breakdown is missing.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; Statistics Austria, basket base 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Labour against materials“For master-builder work alone (that is, the classic shell) the values for 2025 are: labour 127.1, other costs 135.2, total 131.1.”Master-builder work 2025 (2020 = 100): labour 127.1, other costs 135.2, total 131.1; residential building as a whole 130.2Well documented

  What there is. Statistics Austria reports master-builder work as a separate group of the construction cost index; the three values are correct. Compared with residential building as a whole (labour 126.7, other costs 133.6, total 130.2) all three are slightly higher. The gap between other costs and labour is somewhat larger for master-builder work at 8.1 points than for residential building as a whole (6.9).

  What the figures do not show. “Master-builder work” is a category of the statistics; besides the shell in the narrow sense (excavation, concrete, masonry) it also contains plastering, screed and tiling-fixing work. Equating it with the “classic shell” is a decision of the page. For master-builder work we have read only the value for 2025, no series since 2018 and no breakdown for 2026.

  Rating. Well documented: official values, unambiguous in the publication, and the figures on the page are correct; the equation with “shell” is a definition.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“Since 2020 the formula has been linked to inflation: price increase plus a small surcharge.”Increase calculated from inflation: 2020 and 2022 to 2026; 2021 fixed rate; surcharge: 2020 0.95 pp, 2022 0.70 pp, 2024 0.35 pp, otherwise nonePartly documented

  What there is. The texts of the Economic Chamber that we read give a calculation from the consumer price index for 2020 and for 2022 to 2026; where the reference period is given, it ends before the increase. In 2021 the rate was agreed as a fixed rate (2.10%), for 2019 (3.35%) we have read no formula. There was a surcharge on inflation in 2020 (0.95 pp), 2022 (0.70 pp) and 2024 (0.35 pp), none in 2023, 2025 and 2026.

  What the figures do not show. “Since 2020” holds with exceptions: in 2021 a fixed rate applied, and a surcharge was agreed in only three of the eight years. We have read nothing on the reasons for choosing a formula or a fixed rate. Minimum wages, not actual wages.

  Rating. Partly documented: in six of the eight years the texts name the calculation from inflation, a surcharge occurred in only three years, in 2021 the rate was fixed, and for 2019 a formula is missing.

  Evidence. WKO, collective agreement construction 2019; WKO, collective agreement construction 2020; WKO, collective agreement construction result 2021; WKO, collective agreement construction 2022; WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; WKO, collective agreement construction new agreement 2024; WKO, collective agreement construction 2025; WKO, collective agreement construction 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“Because the inflation of the previous year counts, wages lag a year behind price rises.”Gap between the increase and inflation of the same year −4.40 pp to +4.25 pp (mean deviation 2.14 pp), and of the previous year −0.65 pp to +1.40 pp (0.89 pp)Partly documented

  What there is. The increase of 1 May builds on the inflation of the months before, where the reference period is named (2020, 2023 to 2026). Compared with inflation of the same calendar year the increases lie between −4.40 pp (2022) and +4.25 pp (2024), compared with inflation of the previous year between −0.65 pp and +1.40 pp (own calculation). On average over 2019 to 2025 the gap to inflation of the same year is 2.14 pp, to that of the previous year 0.89 pp: the increase fits the earlier inflation better.

  What the figures do not show. “A year behind” is an approximate picture: the reference period ends before 1 May and is not in every year the whole previous year; only for 2026 is it the whole calendar year 2025. For 2019, 2021 and 2022 we have read no reference period.

  Rating. Partly documented: the increases follow the earlier rather than the contemporaneous inflation; the exact “one year” cannot be documented.

  Evidence. WKO, collective agreement construction 2020; WKO, collective agreement construction 2022; WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; WKO, collective agreement construction new agreement 2024; WKO, collective agreement construction 2025; WKO, collective agreement construction 2026; Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; WKO, statistical yearbook, consumer price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“In 2022 inflation stood at 8.6%, wages rose by only 4.2%.”Inflation 2022 8.6% (2021: 2.8%); increase from 1 May 2022 4.20%; gap to inflation in 2021 +1.40 ppSimplifying

  What there is. Both figures are correct: the consumer price index rose by 8.6% in 2022 as an annual average, and the collective agreement raised minimum wages by 4.20% from 1 May 2022 (including a surcharge of 0.70 pp).

  What the figures do not show. The 8.6% is the inflation of 2022 itself. The page gives it directly after the sentence about the inflation of the previous year; in the previous year 2021 inflation was 2.8%, and the increase of 4.20% was 1.40 pp above it. The example therefore shows the delay (price rise in 2022, response in 2023 and 2024), but not that the increase fell short of the inflation of the previous year.

  Rating. Simplifying: the figures are correct, but the comparison does not fit the mechanism described in the sentence before.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; WKO, statistical yearbook, consumer price index; WKO, collective agreement construction 2022. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“In 2023 and 2024 the catch-up effect followed, with +9.5% and +7.15%.”Increase 2023 +9.50%, 2024 +7.15%; inflation 2023 7.8%, 2024 2.9%; 2022 to 2024 chained: wages +22.3%, consumer prices +20.5%Well documented

  What there is. The increases are correct (texts of the Economic Chamber). They were 1.70 pp (2023) and 4.25 pp (2024) above inflation of the same year. Chained over two years (2022 and 2023) minimum wages rose by 14.1% and consumer prices by 17.1%: wages were still below. Over three years (2022 to 2024) it is 22.3% and 20.5%: only with the increase of 2024 were wages above the accumulated price rise (own calculation).

  What the figures do not show. “Catch-up effect” is an interpretation; what is documented are the increases and the calculation, not a decision to catch up. Minimum wages, not actual wages; the points in time do not coincide (1 May against annual average).

  Rating. Well documented: the figures are correct and the calculation confirms the pattern; “catch-up effect” describes it, it does not explain it.

  Evidence. WKO, collective agreement construction 2022; WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; WKO, collective agreement construction new agreement 2024; Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; WKO, statistical yearbook, consumer price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“Skilled worker 2018: €14.20 (collectively agreed minimum hourly wage, wage group II.b). Skilled worker 2026: €19.99 from 1 May 2026.”Minimum hourly wage, skilled worker: 2018 €14.20 (back-calculated), 2022 €16.02, 2024 €18.79, 2025 €19.30, 2026 €19.99Partly documented

  What there is. The value of €19.99 from 1 May 2026 is named by the Economic Chamber page on the 2026 agreement. The value €19.30 for 2025 is on the Economic Chamber page “Lohnordnung Bau 2025” (group II, row b; the page on the 2025 collective agreement names no hourly wage), the value €18.79 for 2024 on the page “Lohnordnung Bau 2024”; both fit each other arithmetically and the values for 2020, 2022 and 2026. The values for 2020, 2022, 2024, 2025 and 2026 have thus been read; 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2023 are calculated from the percentages. The page back-calculated the earlier values from the percentages and says so itself (“rounding deviation possible”). Our calculation deviates by at most €0.01: for 2022 the published value is €16.02 (page: €16.01), for 2023 the calculation gives €17.54 (page: €17.53).

  What the figures do not show. The value of €14.20 for 2018 is not a published rate but back-calculated from the increases. It is the minimum wage of wage group II.b; the wage actually paid and the cost per hour worked are higher. The deviations of one cent change no statement. “Facharbeiter” (skilled worker) is the heading of group II with rows a) and b) on the scales of 2024 and 2025; the scales are called “Lohnordnung” (wage scale) and “Lohntafel” there, only the document on the 2026 agreement speaks of “Mindestlöhne” (minimum wages).

  Rating. Partly documented: the values for 2020, 2022, 2024, 2025 and 2026 have been read, 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2023 are calculated (deviation at most €0.01).

  Evidence. WKO, collective agreement construction 2020; WKO, collective agreement construction 2022; WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; WKO, wage order construction 2024; WKO, collective agreement construction 2025; WKO, wage order construction 2025; WKO, collective agreement construction 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“Wages cumulated: +40.8% (collective wage increases 2019 to 2026). Inflation cumulated: +32.0% (CPI 2019 to 2025).”Wages 2019 to 2026 (eight increases) +40.8%; inflation 2019 to 2025 (seven annual rates) +32.0%; same years 2019 to 2025: +35.9% against +32.0%Partly documented

  What there is. Both figures are correct (own calculation: rates and annual rates chained). The periods are not equally long: eight increases, seven inflation rates. For the same years (2019 to 2025) it is 35.9% against 32.0%, a gap of 3.8 pp instead of 8.7 pp; with inflation brought forward (2018 to 2025) 40.8% against 34.7%, a gap of 6.1 pp. In real terms, that is after deducting inflation, the skilled worker’s minimum wage rose by 2.9% (same years) or 4.5% (inflation brought forward).

  What the figures do not show. Minimum wages, not actual wages; the increases apply from 1 May in each case, inflation is an annual average. That wages rose more than prices is documented, how much more depends on the period. The larger part of the gap arose before 2022: from 2019 to 2021 wages rose by 8.2% and prices by 5.8%.

  Rating. Partly documented: the figures are correct, but comparing two periods of different length enlarges the gap.

  Evidence. WKO, collective agreement construction 2019; WKO, collective agreement construction 2020; WKO, collective agreement construction result 2021; WKO, collective agreement construction 2022; WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; WKO, collective agreement construction new agreement 2024; WKO, collective agreement construction 2025; WKO, collective agreement construction 2026; Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; WKO, statistical yearbook, consumer price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“In the construction cost index the labour component rose by 8.1% in 2024 and by 4.2% in 2025.”Labour (2020 = 100): 2023 112.5, 2024 121.6 (+8.1%), 2025 126.7 (+4.2%)Well documented

  What there is. The rates are in the publication of Statistics Austria on the construction cost index (December 2025); the index values 121.6 and 126.7 give +4.2%. For 2021 to 2023 the editions of December 2022 and December 2024 yield +2.1%, +2.9% and +7.0%. The plausibility check against the May increases is in the row “Wages catch up”.

  What the figures do not show. The sub-index measures wage costs of the building firm, not minimum wages. The values for 2021 and 2022 come from the edition of December 2022; 2022 is marked provisional there, and the edition contains two tables with different values (footnote in the card “Austria: labour and other costs in the construction cost index”).

  Rating. Well documented: official values, unambiguous in the publication, and the figures on the page are correct.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; WKO, collective agreement construction new agreement 2024; WKO, collective agreement construction 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“On top of the hourly wage come ancillary labour costs, special payments and BUAK surcharges, so the cost per hour worked for the building firm is markedly higher.”Germany, construction 2025: labour costs €39.6/h (estimate); standard wage, West, January 2025 €24.07/h; Austria: no euro value for construction foundPartly documented

  What there is. According to Eurostat and Destatis, labour costs per hour are gross earnings plus ancillary labour costs; they are therefore above the wage. For the German construction sector Destatis estimates €39.6/h in 2025, the standard wage of wage group 4 (West) was €24.07/h in January 2025. In the fourth quarter of 2024 ancillary labour costs in the Austrian construction sector rose by 15.3% and wages by 6.2% (Eurostat).

  What the figures do not show. For the Austrian construction sector we found no euro figure for labour costs per hour, and we have not read the BUAK surcharges specifically. “Markedly” therefore cannot be quantified for Austria. The German comparison (standard wage against sector average, different definitions and years) is no counterpart but an order of magnitude.

  Rating. Partly documented: that ancillary costs are added follows from the definition; the amount for Austria is not documented.

  Evidence. Destatis, hourly labour costs in the EU; Eurostat, Statistics Explained, hourly labour costs; Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 March 2026; HDB, wages and pay in the construction trade; Destatis, labour costs 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Wages“Actual wages are raised by parallel shift by the same euro amount.”Parallel-shift clause named on the collective-agreement page for 2025; effect not readPartly documented

  What there is. The collective-agreement page for 2025 that we read names a parallel-shift clause for the wages actually paid (actual wages). That it exists is documented.

  What the figures do not show. How the clause works (same euro amount as for the minimum wages, effective date, exceptions) we have not read. The figures of the page and of this chapter are based on minimum wages; how much the wages actually paid rose, none of the sources we read shows.

  Rating. Partly documented: the clause is documented, its effect (the same euro amount) is not.

  Evidence. WKO, collective agreement construction 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Price shock“Steel at its peak +145%. Iron and steel, Dec 2020 to May 2022 (WIFO).”Iron and steel, December 2020 to May 2022: +66.2% and +47.2%, chained +144.6% (factor 2.45). Germany 2020 to 2022: reinforcing mesh +111.0%. Slovakia 2021: reinforcing bars about +42%Well documented

  What there is. The WIFO gives +66.2% for “iron and steel” in the construction cost index for residential building from December 2020 to December 2021 and +47.2% from December 2021 to May 2022; chained that is +144.6% (own calculation), rounded +145%. The figure on the page is correct. Two independent readings of the WIFO table gave the same values. Other areas show the same direction: in Germany producer prices for reinforcing mesh rose by 52.8% in 2021 and by 38.1% in 2022, together by 111.0%, and those for reinforcing bars by 53.2% in 2021 (Destatis, annual averages); in Slovakia reinforcing bars rose by about 42% in 2021 according to a press report.

  What the figures do not show. “Peak” is the word of the page, not of the source: the WIFO overview ends in May 2022, and whether the highest level had been reached then or prices went on rising it does not show. The figure concerns the price the building firm pays for iron and steel (a material component of the construction cost index), not construction costs: materials as a whole rose by 43.3% over the same period. These are monthly values (December, May); the German and Slovak values are annual figures and thus not measured in the same way.

  Rating. Well documented for the figure: it is in the source as stated, and its direction is confirmed in Germany and Slovakia. That it was the peak is not documented.

  Evidence. WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022); Destatis, building materials 2021; Destatis, building materials 2022; ASB.sk, building materials 2021. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Price shock“Steel, bitumen, diesel and non-ferrous metals have in part more than doubled in 17 months.”December 2020 to May 2022: iron and steel +144.6% (factor 2.45), bitumen +88.5% (1.89), fuels +83.6% (1.84), non-ferrous metals +64.5% (1.65)Simplifying

  What there is. December 2020 to May 2022 is 17 months. According to the chained WIFO figures only iron and steel has more than doubled (factor over 2: 2.45). Bitumen reached 1.89 times, fuels 1.84 times and non-ferrous metals 1.65 times the level of December 2020. The WIFO row for fuels is called “motor petrol including diesel”; “diesel” on the page means that row.

  What the figures do not show. Literally “in part” is right: one of the four materials has more than doubled. Readers easily take the sentence to mean several or all four; for the other three the rise lies between 64.5% and 88.5%. How prices moved after May 2022 the overview does not show.

  Rating. Simplifying: the sentence is true for one of the four materials named and suggests that it was several.

  Evidence. WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022). The full references are in the sources block below.

• Price shock“Bitumen, steel and diesel affect the shell and earthworks particularly strongly.”Basket base 2025, master-builder materials (single weight, share of total costs): structural steel 14.88% (3.31%), diesel and fuels 3.16% (0.70%), bituminous mixture 1.49% (0.33%)Partly documented

  What there is. In the basket of master-builder work structural steel is, after ready-mixed concrete, the second largest position (rank 2 of 34): it weighs 14.88% of the master-builder materials and 3.31% of total costs. Diesel and fuels stand at 3.16% (rank 10), bituminous mixture at 1.49% (rank 18). Bitumen itself is not a position of its own; among the specialist trades there are bituminous waterproofing membranes (1.05% of total costs). The WIFO weights iron and steel at 18.2, bitumen at 2.7 and fuels at 1.6 (the text we read does not name the reference). For steel, weight and price jump (+144.6%) are both large.

  What the figures do not show. For diesel and bitumen the weight is small; “particularly strongly” does not follow from the weights there, it would be an assumption about price swings. For earthworks we read no basket (the basket applies to residential building and housing estates; we did not read that of the road-building index), and “shell” is the page’s own delimitation (row “Shell or residential building”). A weight says how large a position is in the index, not how strongly its price fluctuates.

  Rating. Partly documented: for steel, weight and price jump support the sentence; for diesel and bitumen the weights are small, and for earthworks there is no basket.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022). The full references are in the sources block below.

• Price shock“These peaks have for the most part come back down, but have left a higher base level.”Other costs (materials, energy, transport, equipment) in the construction cost index: 2021 118.6; 2022 137.5; 2023 133.0; 2024 132.9; 2025 133.6 (2020 = 100). Slovak building materials 2023 to 2025: +3.4%; −0.6%; +2.7%Partly documented

  What there is. The second half of the sentence is documented: the sub-index “other costs” stands at 133.6 in 2025 and thus 33.6% above 2020. For the first half we have for Austria only the mixed picture of this sub-index: in 2022 it reached 137.5, the highest of the annual values read, and in 2023 it stood at 133.0, a fall of 4.5 points (−3.3%), that is 12% of the rise on 2020; from 2023 to 2025 it stayed practically unchanged (133.0; 132.9; 133.6). The WIFO overview of materials ends in May 2022, and we did not read series for individual materials for the time after. In Slovakia the rise in building-material prices flattened (annual average +3.4%; −0.6%; +2.7%); a fall back to the level before the shock cannot be seen there. In Germany, of the materials we read only construction timber fell, and already in 2022 (by 11.9%).

  What the figures do not show. “Other costs” mixes materials, energy, transport and equipment; a fall in individual materials such as steel, bitumen or diesel can be hidden in the mixed figure if other items went on rising. The figures we read show neither that the peaks came back down nor that they did not; the level of the mixed index in any case stayed high, and only about an eighth of its rise went back in the annual average. Annual averages can smooth short peaks.

  Rating. Partly documented: the higher base level is documented, the peaks coming back down only to about an eighth in the sub-index “other costs” (2022 to 2023, not afterwards); for individual materials series after May 2022 are missing.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022); Destatis, building materials 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Trades“The classic shell trades (excavation, concrete, masonry) are 26 to 29% higher.” (construction price index for residential building and housing estates, annual average 2025, base 2020 = 100)Construction price index 2025 against 2020: excavation +26.4%, concrete +27.0%, masonry +29.4%; master-builder work as a whole +28.0%, all groups +36.3%Well documented

  What there is. The statistical report SB 2-10 (4th quarter 2025) gives the construction price index for residential building and housing estates in 29 trade groups (annual average 2025, 2020 = 100, excluding VAT). Excavation (clearing, excavation, shoring and deep foundations) stands at 126.4, concrete and reinforced concrete work at 127.0, masonry at 129.4: that is +26.4%, +27.0% and +29.4% against 2020. The range “26 to 29” is right (26.4% to 29.4%). The rows were read in several retrievals and checked against quarterly means and sum rows. Master-builder work as a whole, at 28.0%, lies below the overall index (+36.3%). In Germany concrete work (+4.3%) and masonry (+4.2%) in August 2026 also lie below the overall index for residential buildings (+5.5%, on the previous year).

  What the figures do not show. “Today” means the annual average 2025 on the page; for 2026 we read nothing by trade group. The figure is the price of the work that the building firm charges the client, not its costs, and it is a five-year figure, not an annual rate. The statistics also count setting, plastering and screed work among master-builder work, which the page does not highlight as “shell in the narrow sense”; which trades are the “classic shell” is defined by the page. We did not read the weights of the groups in the overall index.

  Rating. Well documented: three figures from an official table, read several times and checked; measure and year are stated on the page.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Destatis, press release of 10 July 2026; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Trades“Roof, plumbing and timber construction have risen markedly more, by 40 to 49%.”Construction price index 2025 against 2020: roofing +40.2%, roof waterproofing +47.7%, sheet-metal work +48.6%, timber construction +46.1%. Germany, August 2026 (on the previous year): roofing +7.6%, carpentry and timber construction +7.2%, overall +5.5%Well documented

  What there is. The figures are in the table of the report: roofing 140.2 (+40.2%), sheet-metal work on buildings 148.6 (+48.6%), timber construction 146.1 (+46.1%); roof waterproofing (147.7, +47.7%) also lies within the range “40 to 49”. All three lie above the highest of the three classic shell trades (+29.4%) and above the overall index (+36.3%). In Germany roofing (+7.6%) and carpentry and timber construction (+7.2%) in August 2026 also lie above the overall index for residential buildings (+5.5%, on the previous year); in November 2021 carpentry and timber construction, at 38.9%, was the outlier.

  What the figures do not show. Five groups that the page does not show lie higher than each of the three: glass façades (+53.0%), electrical installations (+52.4%), gas and water installations (+52.3%), aluminium windows (+51.3%) and heating and ventilation (+48.8%). “Roof” is not unambiguous on the page: roofing (+40.2%) or roof waterproofing (+47.7%); the range “40 to 49” covers both. It is the price of the work in the annual average 2025 against 2020; what causes the differences between the trades the table does not show.

  Rating. Well documented: all three values and the range agree with the official table, and the direction is confirmed for Germany.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; Destatis, press release of 10 July 2026; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Trades“What a client pays more today than in 2020, by trade group.” (section 05; the chart shows twelve groups)Shown: all eight groups of master-builder work and four of the 21 other construction works (26.4% to 48.6%); all 29 groups: 13.5% to 53.0%Simplifying

  What there is. The chart on the page shows twelve of the 29 trade groups: all eight of master-builder work (nos. 1 to 8) and four of the 21 other construction works (roof waterproofing, roofing, sheet-metal work, timber construction). The groups shown range from 26.4% to 48.6% against 2020, all 29 from 13.5% (passenger lift) to 53.0% (glass façades). Of the twelve groups shown, four lie above the overall index (+36.3%), of the 17 not shown eleven; in total it is 15. The five groups with the highest index all belong to those not shown.

  What the figures do not show. “By trade group” and “today” promise more than the chart contains: it is a selection around the shell, and “today” is the annual average 2025. Anyone who reads the chart as a picture of all trades sees neither the highest values of the scale (the five highest groups are missing) nor the lowest (passenger lift). A client pays more here as a percentage of the 2020 price; how much that is in euros depends on the weight of the group in the project, which the statistics do not give (we did not read the weights of the groups).

  Rating. Simplifying: the selection is understandable for the topic of the page (the shell), but the wording “by trade group” is more comprehensive than the chart.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Earthworks“There is no index series of its own for ‘earthworks’.” (section 07)Among the 29 trade groups of the construction price index for residential building there is no group “earthworks”; Germany reports “earthworks” separately: +5.4% in May 2026, +6.1% in August 2026 (on the previous year)Partly documented

  What there is. In the table of the 29 trade groups of residential building and housing estates (Statistics Austria, SB 2-10) no group carries the name “earthworks”; the nearest are “clearing, excavation, shoring and deep foundations” (no. 1) and “site development, infrastructure” (no. 2). In Germany Destatis names “earthworks” as a construction service of its own in the price index for new residential buildings: +5.2% in November 2019, +5.4% in May 2026 and +6.1% in August 2026 on the previous year’s month.

  What the figures do not show. That there is no series cannot be proved by a web search. We read the table for residential building; we did not use the table for civil engineering in the same report (base and reference not clear when reading), and we did not search other publications of Statistics Austria. The German series shows that a series of its own is possible, but says nothing about Austria.

  Rating. Partly documented: for the table for residential building that we read the sentence is right; as a general statement about Austria it cannot be proved.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2020; Destatis, press release of 10 July 2026; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Earthworks“The best approximation in building construction is the trade group excavation and deep foundations: 126.4 on average in 2025 (2020 = 100).”Clearing, excavation, shoring and deep foundations: index 126.4 (+26.4%), rank 28 of 29 (1 = highest index); site development, infrastructure: 135.3 (+35.3%)Partly documented

  What there is. The value is right: group no. 1 of the report (code LG03) stands at 126.4 in 2025. After the passenger lift (113.5) it is the second lowest of the 29 groups. Besides the excavation pit the group contains clearing, shoring and deep foundations. The neighbouring group “site development, infrastructure” (no. 2) stands at 135.3, 8.9 index points higher; the page counts it as shell, not as earthworks.

  What the figures do not show. Whether it is the “best” approximation cannot be decided from the figures; it is a judgement of the page. If one chose site development instead of excavation, the key figure for earthworks would be 8.9 points higher. The index applies to the price of the work in residential building (building construction), not to earthworks in road or pipeline construction.

  Rating. Partly documented: the figure is right; that it is the best approximation is a judgement without measurement.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Earthworks“Construction cost index, road building: 135.8 on average in 2025 and about 147 in July 2026, a rise of 7.9% within twelve months.”Road building (construction cost index): 2025 135.8 (2020 = 100); July 2026 108.3 (2025 = 100, provisional), chained 147.1; against July 2025 +7.9%. Residential building: 137.4 (+5.2%)Well documented

  What there is. All three figures are documented: 135.8 (annual average 2025, 2020 = 100, press release of 15 January 2026), 108.3 in July 2026 (2025 = 100, provisional) and +7.9% against July 2025 (press release of 14 August 2026). “About 147” is our calculation: 135.8 times 1.083 gives 147.1. The construction cost index for residential building and housing estates rose by 5.2% over the same twelve months and, chained to 2020 = 100, stands at 137.4.

  What the figures do not show. The value for July 2026 is provisional and a single month; it is chained with an annual average as the starting value. The road-building index is a different index from the “excavation” in the sentence before: it measures the costs of the building firm in civil engineering, the excavation the price of the work in residential building. The two figures (126.4 and 135.8) therefore cannot be compared directly.

  Rating. Well documented: all three figures agree with official publications, and “about 147” is correctly calculated.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Earthworks“Earth moving depends heavily on diesel, bitumen, transport and landfill fees, which is why the construction cost index for road building shows the dynamics more clearly.”Road building against residential building (construction cost index): 2025 against 2020 +35.8% against +30.2%; July 2026 on the previous year +7.9% against +5.2%. Germany: road building above the overall index in three of five reporting monthsSimplifying

  What there is. The sentence has two parts. That road building rose more is right for the Austrian construction cost index in both periods measured (+35.8% against +30.2% from 2020 to 2025, +7.9% against +5.2% from July 2025 to July 2026). That diesel, bitumen, transport and landfill are the cause the figures do not show: in the basket of the residential-building index (base 2025) diesel and fuels, transport, landfill and recycling costs, bituminous mixture and gravel, chippings, sand, soil and humus together have a weight of 3.4% of total costs (15.3% of master-builder materials); we did not read the basket of the road-building index. For Germany and Slovakia the finding does not hold throughout: the German price index for road building rose more than the overall index in three of five reporting months, but less in the shock year 2021 (+9.0% against +14.4%), although bitumen rose by 36.1% in 2021 as an annual average. In Slovakia civil engineering has risen 5.4 points less than building construction since 2021 (secondary source, 1st quarter 2025).

  What the figures do not show. The construction cost index, too, contains labour and equipment besides material prices; a link between individual material prices and the road-building index does not follow by itself. The finding “road building rose more” holds for two periods in one country and supports no sentence about earthworks in building construction.

  Rating. Simplifying: the finding (road building rose more) holds for Austria, not everywhere and not in every period; the explanation is an assumption that the figures we read do not support.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2020; Destatis, press release of 8 January 2021; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022; Destatis, press release of 10 July 2026; baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; Destatis, building materials 2021; CEIC, Slovak construction price index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Basket“Concrete and steel alone make up almost a third.” (section 06, referring to the weight of each position “in the materials of master-builder work”)Ready-mixed concrete 17.17% and structural steel 14.88%: together 32.0% of master-builder materials, 7.13% of total costs, 14.3% of all materialsWell documented

  What there is. In the basket of Statistics Austria (base 2025) ready-mixed concrete and mortar have a single weight of 17.17% in the master-builder materials, structural steel and steel mesh of 14.88%; together that is 32.0%, almost a third, as the sentence says. The same two positions make up 7.13% of total costs (3.82% and 3.31%, the figures in the table next to it) and 14.3% of all materials (master builders and specialist trades together). In the whole basket they are positions 1 and 2.

  What the figures do not show. The sentence names the reference (“in the materials of master-builder work”); anyone who reads it as “a third of construction costs” puts the share too high by a factor of 4.5 (32% instead of 7.1%). The weights are shares of the building firm’s costs in the base year, not prices and not building volume; they do not say how much the prices of the two positions changed.

  Rating. Well documented: the figure is right and the reference is in the sentence; a risk remains in the reading “a third of construction costs”.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Basket“Of which relevant to the shell, share of total construction costs” (table with eleven positions of master-builder materials)Eleven positions: 17.03% of total costs, that is 76.5% of master-builder materials; not in the table: timber (master builders 0.80%, specialist trades 1.70%), galvanised sheet and flat steel (specialist trades together 2.91%)Partly documented

  What there is. The table on the page names eleven positions of master-builder materials and calls them “relevant to the shell”. Their figures agree with the basket; together they make up 17.03% of total costs, that is 76.5% of master-builder materials. But the basket divides the materials into master builders and specialist trades, not into shell and finishing: “relevant to the shell” is an allocation by the page. Among the eleven positions are finished plaster, screed and tile adhesive (1.43%) and polystyrene foam boards (1.31%), which one can also allocate to finishing. In the section on trades the page highlights only five trade groups as “shell in the narrow sense” and does not count plastering and screed work. Conversely, positions that can matter for a shell are missing: timber among the master builders (0.80%) and among the specialist trades (1.70%), galvanised sheet and flat steel among the specialist trades (together 2.91%).

  What the figures do not show. The sum of 17.03% is not “the shell”: it leaves out timber, part of the steel positions and labour (labour, at 50.2%, is the largest part of total costs). What counts as the shell is defined by the page; the basket contains no division by construction stages, and the page uses “shell” in two delimitations.

  Rating. Partly documented: the figures are right, the allocation is a matter of definition and not uniform on the page.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• BasketHeader rows, table and chart in section 06: “Labour, total 50.2%”, “Materials, master builders 22.2%”, “Materials, specialist trades 27.5%”, eleven positions with share of total costs and twelve bars with single weightsChecked: three header figures, eleven table rows, twelve bars; all 26 are right. Only the remainder bar “other positions” differs: 17.3% instead of 17.4% (rounding)Well documented

  What there is. We laid every figure against the basket (Statistics Austria, base 2025, 85 positions). All 26 figures are right as far as the page rounds; the only difference is the remainder bar “other positions” with 17.3% instead of 17.4%, because the page calculates 100 minus the rounded bars. The table shows the share of total costs (ready-mixed concrete 3.82%), the chart the single weight in master-builder materials (ready-mixed concrete 17.2%); both are the same position (17.17% times 22.25% gives 3.82%).

  What the figures do not show. Table and chart show different references and different selections: the chart includes timber and combines two equipment positions, the table leaves timber out. The chart has no axis title; the reference is in the sentence before it and in the note. How the weights were determined is not in the table we read; we did not read the research report on it. A weight describes the composition of costs in the base year, not what a particular house costs.

  Rating. Well documented: all figures agree with the official basket; the 0.1 percentage points on the remainder bar are a rounding.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Basket“Anyone who wants to hedge material risks looks first at these two.” (meaning: concrete and steel)Weight: concrete and steel together 32.0% of master-builder materials. Price jump of iron and steel, December 2020 to May 2022: +144.6%. No price series read for ready-mixed concretePartly documented

  What there is. The weight supports the first part: ready-mixed concrete and structural steel are the largest positions of master-builder materials (32.0% together) and positions 1 and 2 in the whole basket (3.82% and 3.31% of total costs). For steel the price also supports the advice: iron and steel rose by 144.6% from December 2020 to May 2022 (WIFO). For ready-mixed concrete we read no price series. Other positions, too, carry more than 2% of total costs, for example timber (2.50%, both groups together), galvanised sheet (2.38%) and windows (2.10%).

  What the figures do not show. The sentence is advice, not a measurement. A weight says how large a position is in the index, not how strongly its price fluctuates and whether a risk can be hedged; that depends on the type of contract (fixed price, variable price), market conditions and term, on which we read nothing. Advice based on weight alone is incomplete.

  Rating. Partly documented: for steel, weight and price jump support the advice, for concrete the price history is missing; as advice, the sentence is not a statement that can be measured.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022). The full references are in the sources block below.

• Marketing and sales“For the marketing costs of real estate Statistics Austria keeps no index.” (section 07)Basket of the construction cost index: 85 positions, none of them for marketing, sales or brokers; we found no index of its own by Statistics Austria for themPartly documented

  What there is. The construction cost index lacks marketing and sales: we read the complete basket (base 2025) with its 85 positions and searched the names for marketing, sales, broker, commission and advertising; there is no such position. In a web search we found no index of its own by Statistics Austria for marketing costs.

  What the figures do not show. That no such index exists anywhere cannot be proved by a web search, and we have read no series from other bodies (chambers, associations, private providers) either. The sentence says nothing about the level of marketing costs.

  Rating. Partly documented: for the construction cost index it is checked; that there is no index at all is not found, but not proved.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Marketing and sales“In developers’ calculations marketing and sales are usually set as a percentage of total investment.”No survey of calculation practice found (Austria, Germany, Slovakia, EU-27); the page itself calls its values “rules of thumb from practice, not official statistics”Popular model

  What there is. We found no study, survey or statistic that shows how developers calculate marketing and sales, neither for Austria nor for Germany, Slovakia or the EU-27 (web search, no specialist database). The page itself says they are rules of thumb from practice. Whether and how widely these costs are set as a percentage of total investment is therefore not documented.

  What the figures do not show. The reference “total investment” is wider than the construction costs of this chapter (it also contains land, planning, financing and further costs of the developer); the percentages therefore cannot be applied to construction costs. Whether total investment, sales price or construction costs is the usual reference we did not find either.

  Rating. Popular model: a widespread assumption for which we found no measurement. That is not a verdict against the sentence but the state of our search.

  Evidence. No source found that states or tests this claim (web search, no specialist database).

• Marketing and sales“Marketing (website, visualisation, brochure, placement): 0.5 to 1.5%”, relating to the total investment costs of a developer projectRule of thumb 0.5 to 1.5% of total investment; source on the page: “rules of thumb from practice”; cross-check: none foundPopular model

  What there is. The page gives the range without a source as a rule of thumb from practice. We found neither a survey of the marketing costs of developer projects nor a source for this range (Austria, Germany, Slovakia, EU-27; web search, no specialist database). Unlike for sales there is also no legal norm here that documents part of the frame.

  What the figures do not show. It remains unclear what the range covers (“placement” presumably means placing advertisements; the page does not explain), whether own staff and internal costs are included and for which project size it applies. A range of 0.5 to 1.5% says nothing about the individual case: number of units, location and market conditions shift it, without our having read figures on this.

  Rating. Popular model: an empirical rule of thumb without a source and without a cross-check; a statement we could not test.

  Evidence. No source found that states or tests this claim (web search, no specialist database).

• Marketing and sales“Sales incl. broker: 2 to 4%”, relating to the total investment costs of a developer projectRule of thumb 2 to 4% of total investment; only the frame of the broker’s commission is documented: Austria 3.0% net (3.6% including VAT) per contracting party according to a guide, Germany regulates the split, not the amountPopular model

  What there is. No source we read documents the rule of thumb itself. Only part of the frame can be documented, the broker’s commission: in Austria the extract of the professional and conduct rules for estate agents (§ 15) names as the maximum commission for brokering purchases 4% of the value up to €36,336.42 and 3% above that (on VAT and on whether the rate applies per contracting party the extract says nothing); a guide (Infina, 2 September 2026) names 3.0% net and 3.6% including VAT, per contracting party. In Germany § 656d of the Civil Code regulates not the amount but the split of the broker’s costs when buying a flat or a single-family house. For Slovakia and the EU-27 we found no rule. The upper limit for one contracting party (3.0% net, 3.6% gross) lies within the range of 2 to 4%.

  What the figures do not show. That does not make the range documented: the commission is calculated on the value of the transaction, that is the purchase price (“of the value” in the extract); the rules of thumb on the page relate to the total investment costs of the developer. According to the page the sales of a developer project contain more than the broker, and whether and to what extent the developer bears the commission is not the subject of the texts we read. The legal norms concern the maximum commission of the broker, not the level of sales costs.

  Rating. Popular model: the legal frame for the broker is documented, the rule of thumb of the page is not.

  Evidence. Rules of professional conduct for estate agents, section 15; Infina, brokerage fees on purchase; German Civil Code section 656d, agreements on brokerage costs. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Calculator“A shell offer or a calculation from any year since 2010, converted to another year with the construction cost index for residential building. The default is the update to today (July 2026).”€500,000 from 2010: €819,800 to July 2026 (page), €824,700 to September 2026 (our calculation). Costs against prices 2020 to 2025: +30.2% against +36.3%Partly documented

  What there is. The page’s calculation is right: all 16 annual values and the value for July 2026 agree with our series (WKO yearbook, base 1990; OeNB table), and the default result is the same (€500,000 from 2010 gives €819,800). With the most recent month, September 2026, the same calculation gives €824,700. The result is the change in the construction cost index, not the price of a particular building project.

  What the figures do not show. Three things need clarifying, none concerns the calculation. First the measure: an offer is a price, the construction cost index measures the costs of the building firm. From 2020 to 2025 it rose by 30.2%, the construction price index by 36.3%; €500,000 from 2020 become €651,200 against €681,500. It also applies to residential building as a whole, not to the shell alone. Second the 2026 row in the table on the page: it compares July 2026 with the annual average for 2025 (+5.5%); the official rate against July 2025 is +5.2%. Third “today”: the page names July 2026, the OeNB table now has values up to September 2026. The page itself says “rule of thumb” and refers to region, capacity utilisation and type of contract; that is right.

  Rating. Partly documented: the calculation is right. Whether the construction cost index is the right measure for an offer is open: an offer is a price, and for the time before 2020 we have no price series on the same base.

  Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Comparison of the areasSummary claim of the comparisons (not on the source page in these words): “Building has become about a third dearer since 2020 or 2021.”2021 to 2025 (annual averages): Austria prices +26.2%, costs +17.9%; Germany +33.9%; EU-27 +24.3%; Slovakia +46.4%. Austria 2020 to 2025: prices +36.3%, costs +30.2%Partly documented

  What there is. A third is about 33%. In the five series we brought to 2021 = 100, the rise from 2021 to 2025 lies between 17.9% (Austria, construction cost index) and 46.4% (Slovakia); Germany, at 33.9%, comes closest to a third, the Austrian prices (26.2%) and the EU-27 (24.3%) lie below. With base year 2020 instead of 2021 the Austrian values come out higher, because the rise of 2021 (prices 8.0%, costs 10.4%) is then counted: prices 36.3%, costs 30.2%. For Slovakia and the EU-27 we have no values for 2020. For Germany the series from 2020 (91.7 on the base 2021 = 100, own calculation) gives 46.0%; but the annual value for 2020 includes the cut in VAT from July to December 2020 and is of limited use as a base.

  What the figures do not show. The series do not measure the same thing: Austria costs or prices excluding VAT for residential building, Germany prices including VAT, Slovakia construction works as a whole, EU-27 new residential buildings. The base year also matters: from 2021 the comparison begins only after the first rise. “A third” lies about in the middle of a range of about 18% to 46%, but fits closely only Germany and is not the value of any one area; for the individual client the price of the project counts, which no index measures.

  Rating. Partly documented: that building became markedly dearer in all four areas is documented (about 18% to 46% in four years); “a third” fits only individual series and depends on the base year.

  Evidence. WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; ASB.sk, construction work 2021; Standard.sk, construction work 2022; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; Eurostat, news of 25 June 2026; IndexBox, construction prices of new residential buildings. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Comparison of the areasSummary claim of the comparisons (the page’s sentence on Austria carried over to all areas; not on the page in these words): “Everywhere wages drive construction costs.”Austria: labour 96% of the rise in construction costs 2023 to 2025, 43% over 2020 to 2025; Germany, Slovakia, EU-27: no split into labour and materials readSimplifying

  What there is. Only for Austria is there a split (own calculation): from 2023 to 2025 96% of the rise in the construction cost index was due to labour, from 2020 to 2025 43%, while from 2020 to 2023 the sub-index “other costs” carried the larger share (73% of the rise; tab “Labour against materials”). For Germany we have no split of the construction price index into labour and materials; side by side stand the collectively agreed wage West (2021 to 2025 +14.3%) and the construction price index (+33.9%), so wages rose less than prices here. For Slovakia construction works (chained 2021 to 2025 +52.0%) and building materials (+44.8%) stand side by side; we found no wage index for the construction industry (the statutory minimum wage for all sectors rose by 31.0%). For the EU-27 we read no split. Hourly labour costs in construction rose in all four areas in the 4th quarter of 2025 (3.7% to 7.4% on the previous year).

  What the figures do not show. No series shows a split by causes: that labour accounts for almost the whole rise in the construction cost index from 2023 to 2025 is a division of the calculation in an index with fixed weights, not a causal analysis, and even for Austria there is no split for 2026. The sequence “materials first, then labour” is visible in Austria; in Germany and Slovakia the material-related series also rose earlier in 2021 and 2022 than the more wage-related ones (agreed wage, construction works as a whole), but that is comparable in direction only, and a “driver” cannot be read from it. For Germany, Slovakia and the EU-27 the basis for “everywhere” is missing.

  Rating. Simplifying: partly documented for Austria from 2023 to 2025 (row “Labour is the real driver”), for the other areas the split is missing; “everywhere” generalises one case.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; HDB, wages and pay in the construction trade; Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; teraz.sk, construction work 2023; teraz.sk, construction work 2024; TASR, construction work 2025; IZ, development of the minimum wage; Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 March 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

• Comparison of the areasSummary claim of the comparisons (the source page compares only wages with inflation): “Building has become dearer by more than consumer prices.”2021 to 2025, construction prices against consumer prices: Austria 26.2% against 24.8% (+1.4 pp), Germany 33.9% against 18.2% (+15.7 pp), EU-27 24.3% against 22.2% (+2.1 pp), Slovakia openPartly documented

  What there is. From 2021 to 2025 construction prices in Austria rose by 26.2%, consumer prices by 24.8%: a gap of 1.4 pp. In the EU-27 the gap is 2.1 pp (24.3% against 22.2%, harmonised index), in Germany 15.7 pp (33.9% against 18.2%). For Slovakia we found consumer prices only up to 2023; the comparison remains open. Over another period and with costs instead of prices the picture reverses for Austria: the construction cost index rose by 32.7% from 2018 to 2025, consumer prices by 34.7%: a gap of −2.0 pp.

  What the figures do not show. The gap in Austria and the EU-27 is small and depends on the period chosen and on the measure (costs or prices); a gap of one to two percentage points does not allow a difference between construction and consumer prices to be read from it. Consumer prices measure the basket of private households, not the prices a client pays; here they serve only as a familiar yardstick. That the gap is markedly larger in Germany holds for prices including VAT and for 2021 to 2025.

  Rating. Partly documented: construction prices rose by more than consumer prices from 2021 to 2025 (narrowly in Austria and the EU-27, markedly in Germany); for Slovakia the comparison is missing, and for Austrian construction costs from 2018 to 2025 it is the other way round.

  Evidence. Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; Statistics Austria, press release of 10 February 2026; Destatis, inflation rate 2025; Destatis, table consumer price index (vpi001j); Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); CBS, HICP euro area and EU; Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 January 2026; WIFO, table 1.4 consumer prices; Eurostat, news of 25 June 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.

The data series in the rows come from the same tables as the tabs “Overall” to “Calculator”; the data are as of 19 October 2026 (Austria up to September 2026). What we did not find is in the card “What this chapter does not contain”, where sources contradict each other is in the card “Where figures contradict each other”.

Every card in this chapter carries labels at the top left. They say what kind of information the card consists of, because measurements, models and own calculations are not equally reliable and should not be mixed up.

Two scales should be kept apart from these. The evidence level belongs to a statement (card “The ladder”): how well is it covered by measurements we read? The reading level belongs to a source (sources block at the end of the page): how much of it did we see, the whole text, parts, only the press release, a database query, a page that reproduces the figure, or only a search hit? The reading level says nothing about the quality of the source, only about what we saw of it. Reading was done through a retrieval tool that renders pages; important figures were compared several times, and on 19 October 2026 a second, independent party read more than 250 values again against the sources (no figure deviated; what was changed were source references, labels and reservations). A comparison with the printed versions is still to be done.

This chapter is as complete as the sources allowed, and no more complete. “Not found” means: our search did not turn up a value (web search, no specialist database); it does not mean that none exists. “Not read” means: the source is known or obvious, we did not open it. What is missing is in no result; every result holds only for the data we had.

How to read this. Reading the page of a statistical office and reading the page of a data portal are not the same; the reading level of every source is in the sources block. Pages that the retrieval refused we did not obtain in another way.

Evidence. Eurostat, Statistics Explained, price levels of investment; Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; HDB, key construction data 2023, cost structure of the main construction trade 2021; Bauprofessor, cost structure of the construction industry 2018; WKO, structural business statistics, construction (1010), 2024; WKO, structural business statistics, construction industry (2090), 2024; Rules of professional conduct for estate agents, section 15; Infina, brokerage fees on purchase; German Civil Code section 656d, agreements on brokerage costs; Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; WIFO, forecast of construction cost development to 2023 (September 2022); Eurostat, Euro Indicators of 19 March 2026; IZ, development of the minimum wage. The full references are in the sources block below.

Anyone who reads several sources finds figures that do not agree. That is part of the matter: statistics are corrected afterwards, measures and periods differ, and media do not always reproduce figures as they stand in the source. Here are the contradictions we found while reading for this chapter, with the value we use and the reason.

The same source: a later edition or another base

Different sources or tables, different figures

The source page against the sources

How to read this. A contradiction does not mean that one page is wrong. Mostly the data, the method, the reference date or the definition differ. Where we do not know the reason, it says that it is not stated. The pages were read between 16 and 19 October 2026; figures may change later.

Evidence. Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2025 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2022 (report); Statistics Austria, construction cost index December 2024 (report); Statistics Austria, press release construction cost index December 2022; Statistics Austria, press release of 15 January 2026; OeNB, ISAWeb construction cost index (report 6.5); Statistics Austria, press release of 14 August 2026; Statistics Austria, standard documentation construction price and cost index; Statistics Austria, basket base 2025; Destatis, building materials 2022; Bremen, overview of price indices for building and civil engineering; Destatis, press release on February 2021; Destatis, press release on May 2021; Destatis, press release on August 2021; Destatis, press release of 10 January 2022; Destatis, press release on February 2022; Destatis, table construction price indices (bpr110); baulinks.de, construction prices August 2026; Eurostat sts_copi_q (via DBnomics); OECD via FRED, residential construction cost Germany; Eurostat sts_copi_a (via DBnomics); Statistics Austria, construction price index by trade group, Q4 2025; WKO, structural business statistics, construction (1010), 2024; WKO, structural business statistics, construction industry (2090), 2024; HDB, key construction data 2023, cost structure of the main construction trade 2021; WKO, collective agreement construction 2022; WKO, collective agreement construction agreement 2023; Statistics Austria, annual inflation 2025; WKO, statistical yearbook, consumer price index; WKO, statistical yearbook, construction cost index base 1990; leadersnet.at, construction costs July 2026. The full references are in the sources block below.